Computer Games For Advanced Development In Today's Schooling Systems
Computer games could be regarded as a future cornerstone in education and development. While most of today's youth may spend many hours a day gaming, customized gaming programs if utilized correctly for mental development would have a very positive impact in today's schooling system.
Studies were conducted by the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China and Macquarie University in Sydney, taking MRI scans of 27 gamers before and after they had reached ‘expert levels’. They found that the participants had developed enhanced functional connectivity and gray matter volume in insular sub-regions of the brain.
What this means in simplified terms is increased muscle control and sensory perception skills such as seeing and hearing; memory function; emotion; speech; and decision formation. The students are faster, smarter, better communicators, more emotionally balanced and have improved short-term memories. This is important because according to multiple studies students in developed nations such as Australia and America have declining standards despite similar funding as previous years.
“We are being outpaced by other nations… It’s not that their kids are any smarter than ours—it’s that they are being smarter about how to educate their children.” - Barack Obama
Could playing video games boost global education standards?
Further studies have shown people that play specific types of games can actively visualize and process internal information up to 25% faster than people who do not game. It is for this reason that you could think of gaming as weightlifting for the brain. Cognitive development has never been so fun!
The world’s schooling systems have yet to incorporate gaming into their curriculum and there is a clear separation in the cognitive abilities between students who do game and those that do not. By bringing gaming into the schooling system we would be able to level out the playing field for the students who miss out. Not all students have access to high end PC’s or gaming devices in their homes so this could be regarded as an essential service schools can provide.
Different games develop different ways of thinking. For example games like Eve online (a space colonization simulation) puts large amounts of intense focus on design, finance, team work, strategy, long-term goals and communication. The game design introduces faction play made of thousands of players who play in large highly competitive global networks much like the we see in mega-corporations. Every player has an opportunity to build from a small vessel all the way up to owning and operating a planetoid sized vessel sheltering and supplying thousands of real life players while running their own virtual empire.
Other games like Call of Duty rely more on fast-paced reflexes, visual and auditory refinement as well as communication and strategic thinking. Groups of up to 4 people per team compete to tally ‘kills’ and remain the last man standing in an ever decreasing play radius and very complex maneuvering tactics as well as multi-weapon operations and concise communication standards.
It isn’t hard to Imagine new projects for students like developing plans for and building a skyscraper with 40 students working on specific functions tasked into groups. Group 1 mining, Group 2 security and logistics, Group 3 framework building and Group 4 electrical components. Projects like these can teach students co-operation and teamwork unlike any class available today. The beauty is that it would also boost the social standing of students who have difficulty in communication and would have them regularly practice verbalization. It also can inspire these students to find their passion in engineering, electronics, architecture and team management. The potential is there to discover their strengths.
Classes like this have the ability to connect subjects like mathematics, a subject that causes students to regularly groan. The students focus on mathematics would likely double if they were learning advanced formulae to calculate gaming statistics, create elaborate budgeting techniques, or any incorporated practice that gives them an edge in the gaming world. Likewise games like World of Warcraft a Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game (MMORPG) can inspire creative writing, as players interact with a full immersive world much like something you would read in Lord of the Rings. For example a school assignment could be to flesh out and write a story inspired by the latest quest your team embarked on, which students would quite enjoy as they are telling their own story.
Imagine a geology class where the students could be immersed in a 3D landscape while learning how to calculate the heights of mountains and the depth of waterways in a real-time first person perspective. Previous generations had to rely on text on pages, but most people are visual learners and would find their foothold in this new learning landscape. Grand tours can be conducted with 3D goggles taking students to famous sites, examining what planning was involved in building bridges or landmarks and getting a look at natures most wondrous formations.
Gaming can not only provide benefit to students but also to the elderly according to a finding in a study conducted by the Université de Montréal. The study recruited 33 people ages 55-75 who were divided into three groups, one of which were required to play super Mario 64 for 30 minutes a day 5 days a week for 6 months and compared the results against those playing piano and a control group. The group that played games saw an increase in gray matter as well as increases in short-term memory. The results were promising and could perhaps stave off mild cognitive impairment and perhaps even prevent Alzheimer's disease.
Further studies conducted by Digital Creativity Labs in New York have found that those that are successful playing 'Multiplayer Online Battle Arenas' (MOBAs) have a higher IQ than those that play primarily First Person Shooters (FPS). These kinds of studies highlight that customizing protocols for students based on their strengths and weaknesses is important. Students that have underdeveloped reflexes would benefit a great deal from FPS while students with a lower IQ grouping would develop more playing MOBAs.
Many teachers believe that creating successful students for the twenty-first century depends on increasing our efforts towards encouraging design, solving complex tasks, working with and interacting with critical problem solving thought processes and innovative thinking. Increasingly, university and industry research confirms video games do support and promote this kind of learning. Moving forward into a new and ever changing world where technology scaling creates heavy reliance on adaptability and rapid learning, we need to consider the possibility that the current learning curriculum has become outdated and is due for a large upgrade. It is almost like our schools are still based on Windows XP while the world is running on Windows 10.
It is this authors belief that the future is bright for the students who are able to think differently. We are in a way, co-evolving with technology and in order to keep up we should consider a universal overhaul which incorporates at least 1 new class in every school that has its basis in Gaming technologies. Our students will be happier, more focused, better socialized and perform better overall in other classes and studies. It paves the way forward for new developers in a gaming industry worth hundreds of billions of dollars and a competitive e-sports phenomena that is sweeping the world today.