SITE Blog

I have contacted several projects, including some international colleagues, who are working on games or simulations intended to improve teaching and the preparation of teachers. I have 4 to 6 groups in mind at this point in time (Korea National University of Education, simSchool, Cook School District from Western Oregon University, and the aha!Process SimClassroom application).

The idea would be to explore how these applications represent teaching and learning with computational models, and to introduce people to the audiences, purposes, and potential uses of the applications.

If you know of others working in this area and would like to recommend names to me, I would love to expand the working group to be as inclusive as possible, even if that means starting more than one panel or symposium or just ensuring that there is a strong thread of these projects that can present together when possible.

Thanks!

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The “ITEST” community (NSF funded projects for IT experiences for students and teachers) includes several projects that focus on the use of games and sims in STEM education. I have heard interest from 3 projects thus far that could create a panel on that topic for SITE 2008.

I’d like to identify 1 or 2 more projects at a minimum from either the ITEST or the broader community and invite them to join in that panel. Please help pass along names that I can contact about this…and provide me with any other feedback or inquiry you may have about this proposed panel.

If there is a strong response, we might consider dividing into elementary, middle and high school approaches…or into “using” versus “building” games and sims approaches…or contrasting approaches, etc.

I’d love to hear other thoughts about this idea for a panel and most important, to get other names to invite.

Many thanks!

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For months I have been studying what I thought were new technologies to find that in the education world the social networking was all the rage.

Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture:

Media Education for the 21st Century (Read the article)

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