Notes

STEAM Education and Video Games: Taking STEAM Educational Games to the Next Level
Education
Is this free article highly relevant to this category?

Educators experienced many challenges over the past decade as the educational system has undergone change driven by new government and community policies targeted at improving educational outcomes and shifting focus in line with changing career and industry landscapes. And like any large industry, there's been much disagreement internationally with some of the changes, most famously in recent time adding the "A" for arts to STEM to evolve it into STEAM education. So when blended and multimodal learning gains a growing number of credibility, a common question that invokes debate is whether STEAM educational games may be used as a serious educational tool in the teacher?s toolbox.
The meaning of knowing today has shifted from being able to recall and repeat information to having the ability to find it, evaluate it and use it compellingly at the right time and in the proper context; using higher order skills, like the ability to think, solve complex problems or interact critically through language and media. In developing these skills, many STEAM education experts believe a significant part of improving our current educational approaches should include a method to help kids study from what they do best ? play!

Games naturally support this form of education. Some experts argue that games are, first of all, learning systems, and that this accounts for the sense of engagement and entertainment players experience. STEAM educational games are designed to create a compelling complex problem space or world, which players come to understand through self-directed exploration. Their meta-game and quest systems are made to deliver just-in-time learning also to use data to help players understand how they're doing, what they need to work on and w here to go next. Games create a compelling need to know, a have to ask, examine, assimilate and master certain skills and content areas.

According to the PEW Research Center, as many as 97% of tweens and teens play computer games. Games are wildly popular among children and teens and many educators seek to utilize this popularity and use games to increase engagement in the classroom and in the home. "Game players regularly exhibit persistence, risk taking, attention to detail, and problem solving, and all behaviors that ideally would be regularly demonstrated in school." ? MIT, Education Arcade. Similarly, the Federation of American Scientists state that: "The success of complex video gaming demonstrates that games can teach higher-order thinking skills such as for example strategic thinking, interpretative analysis, problem solving, plan formulation and execution, and adaptation to rapid change. These are the abilities U.S. employers increasingly seek."

One of the most significant research on STEAM educational games and game-based learning is performed by the Games and Learning Assessment Lab (GlassLab), which was established as a collaboration between your Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation. The R&D is being conducted by the Institute of Play, the Educational Testing Service (ETS), Pearson, Inc., Electronic Arts (EA), and the Entertainment Software Association (ESA). Their research has been very promising, with one study finding that when digital games were compared to other instruction conditions without digital games, there is a moderate to strong effect in favor of digital games with regards to broad cognitive competencies. "For students sitting in the median who doesn?t have a casino game, his / her learning achievement could have increased by 12% if he or she had that game," reports the team for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. In the world of education achievement, 12% is significant. In exactly the same study, the researchers also looked at simulations, and in those studies, students improved by 25%. That?s huge.1

In a related study, Joan Ganz Cooney Center surveyed 700 K-8 teachers on what they?re using digital games in the classroom. Nearly 75% of K-8 teachers reported using digital games for instruction, with 55% of the teachers saying their students play at the very least weekly. Digital game using teachers also say they?re using games to deliver content mandated by local (43%) and state/national curriculum standards (41%), and to assess students on supplemental (33%) and core knowledge (29%).2

"By balancing gameplay enjoyment having an appropriate degree of challenge, games have the ability to keep players in their own unique optimally challenging and engaging zone for learning," wrote Jan Plass, an NYU Professor of digital media and learning sciences. STEAM educational games allow students to understand at their own pace without constant oversight. Players? experience could be tailored predicated on their performance and preferences. Should they solve problems correctly, the educational game can adjust to present more difficult challenges. If they have a problem with a concept, the game can present the same concept in a different context or decrease the difficulty level until the student gets it. An impressive new entrant to the market is Planeteers: a STEAMCraft Adventure which teaches STEAM education, coding and robotics utilizing an educational sandbox, disguised as a video game. With similarities to Minecraft meets Scratch or Tynker, Planeteers has hundreds of STEAM education quests mapped to a thorough STEAM curriculum (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Math) that aims to teach kids important 21st Century skills in a great, highly engaging open world environment. Another generation of STEAM educational games, Planeteers even teaches computer programming for kids in a fun interactive way. There are home and school versions, and we encourage parents to look at the games features.

Bill Gates famously said: "Imagine if kids poured their time and passion right into a video game that taught them math concepts while they barely noticed, since it was so enjoyable." As investment in STEAM educational games grows, parents and teachers don?t need to imagine anymore, with new games released on a monthly basis that augment teaching STEAM programs, education for kids, robotics, engineering and design along with other core 21C subjects. To learn more, checkout our curated games list for the big five educational games your kids ought to be playing now.

STEAM Craft Edu Limited is among the best steam schools that develop complex computer coding for kids educational programs.

Related Articles - steam schools, steam educational games, steam education,
Here's my website: https://bbs.pku.edu.cn/v2/jump-to.php?url=https://www.articlesubmited.com/the-right-to-education-full-form/