And go get this free download.
Parents no longer have an excuse not to know what is up with video games these days. Parents and teachers can also see what GOOD things video games can do!
Seriously, stop reading this and go get the download. Stop back to discuss it if you’d like, though!
Melanie Stegman, yours truly, will be presenting her research on Immune Attack, development of the sequal and all about using game to teach and learn. April 23, 6PM. At the FabLab on North Capitol at P. If you have made a game, bring it with you! Please Register Here.
Video Games can teach science by presenting and requiring your interaction with complex 3D models of things you otherwise need to imagine because they are too small, to rare, or too far away to see.
Video games can also teach science to you if you decide to MAKE your own video game. If you design it on paper you are doing systems thinking, planning, designing, and considering human computer interactions. If you program a game you are learning to convert a designer’s instructions accurately, how to creatively solve programming problems, and how to optimize your system.
Video Games can also be made about science, as well. If you make a game about science, then you are learning the science yourself and everyone who plays your game may learn, to.
Have you made a video game? Would you like to show it off? Have you ever submitted it to a contest, like the STEM Video Game Challenge? Have you almost created a game and want to get some feedback? Are you just curious about what anyone could actually be learning from a video game?
Then come out and meet game developer and many other types of design and maker people at Fab Lab DC.
Melanie will talk about Immune Attack and what students are learning. There will be time before and after the presentation to try out some other great science games:
History of Biology
Minesweeper
Fold It
Cellcraft
You Make Me Sick
EtRNA
You Make Me Sick
+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_
This event is an official part of the month long USA Science and Engineering Festival. The Finale Expo will be April 29-30 in the DC Convention Center April 27-29th. Come out and meet Melanie at the FAS booth, talk with scientists in the “Encounter’s with Scientists” booth (FAS hour is 11AM Sunday the 29th) and meet the Fab Lab people in their booth #3050!
Please register here:http://learnfromgamessteg
This event is an official part of the month long USA Science and Engineering Festival. The Finale Expo will be April 29-30 in the DC Convention Center April 27-29th. Come out and meet Melanie at the FAS booth, talk with scientists in the “Encouter’s with Scientists” booth (FAS hour is 11AM Sunday the 29th) and meet the Fab Lab DC people at their booth (#3050)!
What does a scientist look like? See above.
The National Science Teacher Association (NSTA) had a big Science Rocks event at their annual meeting last week. A few of us lucky scientist types were invited to represent how cool being a scientist can be!
Cindy Hasselbring (Albert Einstein Distinguished Educator Fellow & Math Teacher) and Science Rockstars: Leland Melvin, Anousheh Ansari, Corey Powell, Ken Ono, enjoying the show before they spoke. Not shown: Simona de Silvestro, Grand Hanks and Melanie Stegman.
You can meet Anousheh Ansari in person at the Science and Engineering Festival Expo April 28-29.
What does a chemistry experiment look like? See below.
In the World’s Largest Chemistry lesson, we shook a highly absorbent polymer to see if it felt cooler after evaporation…. See what happens! Turn down your volume! Grand Hanks is the chemist who is teaching the lesson on the microphone and his partner is the DJ who is laying down an excellent polymer shaking beat.
NSTA Science Rocks March 2012 from Melanie Stegman on Vimeo.
Here I am, Melanie Stegman, being a panelist at Science Rocks. I am sitting between two Astronauts! Anousheh Ansari and Leland Melvin.
Project Based Learning works. A project that your students are excited about works better. A project that allows the students to build levels of abstract and complex concepts upon a stable scaffold is even better. And a project with a robust scaffold that can address the true complexities of a scientific system is something that many scientists would discuss with your students… and something that would generate untold number of questions from your students.
Sounds too good to be true, I realize. But I have worked with five classes of high school students who created materials related to video game design: paper and pen design documents, three-dimensional and two dimensional computer generated models and two dimensional video games. The production of any of these provides a scaffold for a project that holds the student’s interests and motivates them to add to it. Their design document or video game plan tethers a world of abstract concepts and esoteric facts to a story that they wrote. So the concepts and facts are automatically related to their frame of view and level of understanding.
I am collaborating with professors at George Mason University. Professors Kevin Clack and Kim Sheridan run a computer programming class. They are interested in helping high school students feel competent in STEM fields. They asked me to be their high school programming student’s “Client.” I asked the students to create a Neurological Immune Attack game for me. The game should focus on one of four molecular pathways that are core to Neurology.
Here is a link to our work on NSF page.
Here is our reference:
Students Designing Video Games about Immunology: Insights for Science Learning
Neda Khalili, Kimberly Sheridan, Asia Williams, Kevin Clark, Melanie Stegman
Computers in the Schools
Volume 28, Issue 3 pp. 228-240 | DOI: 10.1080/07380569.2011.594988
Find GameMaker Windows/Mac/Linux here! http://www.yoyogames.com/gamemaker
Find a scientist: www.nationallabnetwork.org The National Lab Network is a place where you can find an expert to come to your classroom.
Check out this great Immune Attack demonstration video!!
If you would like to see what Immune Attack is exactly like, watch MrKenbinkley’s video of himself playing Immune Attack!
Spoiler alert! This video is better if you are a teacher, and less interesting if you are a PLAYER! If you are a student and you are curious, then just download the game (free) and play for yourself!
Recent comments: