Conference proceeding
Games, Science, and Identity Change: Findings From a Year-Long Teacher Professional Development
European Conference on Games Based Learning, pp.173-180
01 Oct 2017
Abstract
This paper reports interpretive findings from an ongoing study undertaken to develop pre-service Science teachers' (a) knowledge and skills to facilitate identity change through game-based learning (GBL); and (b) professional identities as teachers who adopt GBL as an instructional approach in the future. Projective Reflection (PR) served as the theoretical model to frame learning as identity exploration and change in digital worlds. The Game Network Analysis (GaNA) framework was employed to define the knowledge and skills essential for educators to employ GBL. GaNA, through pedagogical and analytical frameworks, enables teachers to consciously focus on the pedagogy and content of games as well as the process for employing GBL in classrooms in a given context (Shah, 2015). GaNA includes the Play Curricular activity, Reflection Discussion (PCaRD) model for GBL, the inquiry, communication, construction, and expression (ICCE) framework, and the ecological conditions (technological, pedagogical, and social) impacting the analysis and integration of a game-based curriculum in formal and informal learning contexts (Shah & Foster, 2015). Projective Reflection (PR) defines learning as a process of self-transformation over time for identity change in immersive interactive environments such as games (Foster, 2014). PR informs the design of experiences and assessments in games and game-based curricula to facilitate an intentional change in learners' knowledge, interest and valuing, self-organization and self-control, and self-perception and self-definition in an academic domain or a career (Shah, Foster & Barany, 2017). Together, GaNA and PR offer one approach to support teachers in facilitating learning as identity exploration and change with games. The paper illustrates the application of GaNA and PR by describing the eight professional development (PD) sessions offered once a month from October 2016-May 2017. The paper showcases the change in participants' professional identities as teachers who would adopt GBL to facilitate identity change in their future practice. The paper concludes with implications for researchers and educators who are interested in developing and assessing the impact of teacher professional development opportunities for GBL both in terms of facilitating the acquisition of the essential skills and motivating teachers' actions to adopt the instructional approach.
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Details
- Title
- Games, Science, and Identity Change: Findings From a Year-Long Teacher Professional Development
- Creators
- Aroutis FosterMamta Shah
- Publication Details
- European Conference on Games Based Learning, pp.173-180
- Publisher
- Academic Conferences International Limited
- Resource Type
- Conference proceeding
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- School of Education
- Identifiers
- 991019170322304721