3rd World Farmer

I chose 3rd World Farmer because I failed after one minute of trying the game. It is a difficult game, but interesting to think about for someone who has never been, or lived in a third world country, or for those who have. After playing a second time I got more interested in the game and began to try and make smart decisions on my farm, but still did not succeed.

What is 3rd World Farmer?

"3rd World Farmer is a new kind of game. An experiment in the genre of Serious Games, it aims at simulating the real-world mechanisms that cause and sustain poverty in 3rd World countries.

In the game, the player gets to manage an African farm, and are soon confronted with the often difficult choices that poverty and conflict necessitate. We find this kind of experience efficient at making the issues relevant to people, because players tend to invests their hopes in a game character whose fate depends on him. We aim at making the player "experience" the injustices, rather than being told about them, so as to stimulate a deeper and more personal reflection on the topics."

A language learning objective that could be generated from this games is students will learn basic vocabulary words, and how to balance their wants and needs using the serious game 3rd World Farmer. I will assess my students by having them write to me about their experiences each time the game is played, or do a class discussion. Students will be able to use the word learned from the game as well as communicate with those around them about real-world situations. This topic of 3rd world countries could also be a very sensitive subject some of your students, so I suggest knowing your students pretty well before using this game.

Can using games in an L2 Class Really Be Beneficial?

According to "7 Things You Should Know About Gamification," "The application of game elements in non-gaming situations of to motivate or influence behavior."Using gaming to motivate learners is a great thought for now and the future. I never thought about how much more motivating gaming could be than a worksheet. According to Stephan J. Franciosi's "A Comparison of Computer Game and Language-Learning",
Task Design Using Flow Theory "recent studies show that a gaming approach to language instruction is more intrinsically motivating than non-gaming approaches. "This article explores the ways that goals, feedback and skill/difficulty balance are typically implemented in computer games and tasks. The article touches on constructivism, and that constructivism favors the notion that learning is an active process which alternately involves skill-challenging experiences and reflective thinking. Franciosi compares computer gaming and language learning task design using flow theory, and it turns out computer games and 

language learning tasks are fundamentally identical in that both can be considered goal-oriented, rule-driven activities. He points out computer gaming could be used to prepare learners with authentic and real-world communication skills. "Three important insights resulted from this comparison: (1) goals should be concrete, quantifiable objective, and appeal to learner interests; (2) feedback as a means of fostering flow should be considered in addition to feedback as a means of supporting reflection; (3) task difficulty and player skill are ideally balanced moment-by-moment at the individual level."

A “Fun” Online Video Game For English Language Development I found was Phantasy Quest. I played this game once. I thought this game would work well for language learners because you have to search for things and you are stranded on a deserted island. Students need to learn the language as they are trying to figure out how to get off the deserted island. The game motivates them to try and learn more vocabulary words and direction skills faster to then move on to the next level.  There seem to be a lot of basic words the students can learn including cat, rope, lantern, clothes, etc. It's just very basic. I'm sure by also playing the game the students will begin to talk to you (the teacher) about how to advance or tell you what they collected. Students will also possibly talk to each other to help each other get further in the game. You could also place students in pairs to help each other during the game and work on more communication skills together. All these strategies are a great way to develop better communication skills and the students are motivated to do it. It's a  win, win! A learning objective that I would use for this game is students will learn basic vocabulary words, including direction skills, that will help their future communication skills. Besides the basic communication skills being used with the teacher and students, the teacher will be able to assess that students knowledge of the words they are truly learning from the game. Students could keep a 'new word' journal to look back at. This way you could see if the students are paying attention to the skills being learned or simply trying to get to the next level without grasping any new concepts. While the students were in pairs I would also use a walkthrough so students could work on direction skills and communicating with each other. They would be using team work while building new vocabulary, as well as trying to advance on the game. I would also try and use images from this game around the classroom, so students could continue building their vocabulary, or I  could help them in they're having trouble with any words. We could make our own adventure out this game, and be stranded on our own classroom island trying to escape. This game has some advanced words so students may need your help.

Twitter-chatter #Edtechchat

I had never heard of twitterchat until today. It's a shame. What a great communication device. I do believe that twitterchat is a great way for professional development. I came across a youtube video about President Obama and "The White House- Student Film Festival," I was amazed by Obamas' attempt to, within 5 years, demand technology in every classroom in the U.S. I would have never even heard of this unless I went on this twitterchat at this exact moment. I think that's incredible. How easy communication becomes. As a future teacher I could simply browse through all the posts and learn an extreme amount. I honestly never thought of twitter for this purpose until now. These chats can definitely broaden my horizons to future educating. I think because anyone is allowed to use the chat, the amount of information is endless. Twitterchat is a very simple way to find new information as a teacher, and also you do not have to even post anything if you don't want to. You can simply browse what other's have to offer, and possibly when you feel more comfortable sharing information you may do so. I also think the twitterchat is great because you never know what people will post. I came across a blog I had already seen, which I found to be ironic. I  really just think this chat can connect you to educators all over, which is important because each state, town, etc. is different. You can view others opinions and ideas in a second! Twitterchat is a nice way to develop your technology skills as an educator and keep update with new up and coming technology offered.

"Tweet-Tweet"

According to " 10 Amazing Ways For Teachers & Tutors To Use Twitter In Education" "Twitter like all other social media is a virtual Aladdin’s cave."This fits twitter to a "t." There is so much information a learner can receive from twitter, if the teacher takes the first steps. There are so many ways teachers can connect with their students using twitter. You can set up a 'classroom' hashtags around lessons and topics. This way the students can look back and keep a record of what was taught. "Hashtags also make it easy to follow interesting topics related to the curriculum or anything else that might broaden a student’s knowledge base." Twitter makes it easy for an after class discussion or if students need help they can get a hold of the teacher or their classmates for help! Language learners can begin to use BICS. There is no pressure to communicate "correctly" and hashtags keep everything together. I find twitter could be especially useful for intermediate ELLs to become familiar with English from a whole different perspective. Teachers can also use twitter as a bulletin board, interact with students parents, or even create a classroom newspaper. It genius!! I would love to able to communicate with my parents on a daily basis and that's easy. Teachers can easily tweet something that all the parents could see, or connect directly. My favorite idea I found was a history graduate posting events from WWII and it could become an interesting history project that brings things to life. You could pick all different events in history. It's a new way for learning.

According to an article called "How To Use (Internal) Microblogging For Education,"
"Microblogging is an outstanding technique for supervision."  You can encourage students to track their  activities in a microblog.  If students are posting information about their work, this creates more time for the teacher to participate in the students work and track their progress. We are all able to then stay connected! Teachers never seem to have enough time to really track each students progress, twitter could possibly make our lives a little easier. Possibly more time consuming, but we also would have a better grasp on each student as an individual learner. You can create microblogs for everything!