Literacy Game Research Articles

Effects of Adapted Dialogic Reading on Oral Language and Vocabulary Knowledge of Latino Preschoolers at Risk for English Language Delays.

In this single-case design study, we examined the effects of an adapted dialogic reading intervention on the oral language and vocabulary skills of four Latino preschool children who were at risk for English language delays. We used adapted dialogic reading strategies in English and two literacy games that included a rapid naming activity and playing with props to retell the stories in the books. Results indicated improvement in both oral language and vocabulary skill knowledge from baseline to intervention for all children. Children also showed improvement from baseline to intervention in their story retells during generalization probes. Limitations and implications for future research and practice are discussed.

Ante Up: Econocide and the Literacy Game in U.S. Prisons

Ante Up: Econocide and the Literacy Game in U.S. Prisons

Enlisting Social Media to Facilitate Collaborative Bibliography Building

Social media is an important everyday activity of most college-aged students. Such students are accustomed to collaborating with peers and seeking their advice. Bibliography building and library research generally are solitary endeavors. For most college students, these endeavors are fraught with difficulties. The time is right to investigate whether the infusion of social media into bibliography building enables students to leverage their bibliography building efforts with those of their peers so that everyone benefits. The purpose of this study is to determine whether the social media aspect of collaborative bibliography building benefits students tasked with finding information for their research papers. It enlists data and analyses from an actual information literacy game that had a social media aspect to its collaborative bibliography functionality and was played by undergraduate students to answer research questions about the development of their topics, the origins of the sources players cited in their research papers, the number of sources players and nonplayers cited in their research papers, and whether players were more likely than nonplayers to cite scholarly sources. Answers to this study’s questions demonstrate the promise of social media for collaborative bibliography building, research paper topic formulation, and library research generally.

The Meaning and Relevance of Video Game Literacy

In his article The Meaning and Relevance of Video Game Literacy Jeroen Bourgonjon argues that video gaming deserves scholarly attention as a social practice and a site for meaning-making (and thus learning). Based on an overview of contemporary trends in literacy and cultural studies, he further argues that video games cannot be approached like traditional text forms, serve as an important frames of reference for young people, and call for informed decision-making in the context of culture, education, and policy. He provides an integrative perspective of video game literacy by collecting theoretical insights about the distinctive dimensions and elements, and situating them in Bill Green's sociocultural 3D model of literacy, determining the operational, cultural, and critical aspects of video game literacy.

The effect of using a mobile literacy game to improve literacy levels of grade one students in Zambian schools

This intervention study was conducted to document conditions under which a computer based literacy game (GraphoGame™) could enhance literacy skills of first grade students in an African city. The participants were first grade students from Government schools (N = 573). These students were randomly sampled into control (N = 314) and various intervention groups (N = 259). GraphoGame™ was administered on cellphones to students at their schools under supervision. Each student in the study was assessed using a battery of locally developed cognitive tests that measured emergent literacy skills (Orthography test), decoding competence (Spelling test), vocabulary (Picture Vocabulary Test—PVT) and arithmetic (Zambia Achievement Test—ZAT). There was a positive effect of the game for the Spelling test—which closely targeted the skill GraphoGame™ is designed to promote. The most effective intervention combined exposure of both the teachers and the students to the game. Initial letter knowledge was a good predictor of final letter knowledge on GraphoGame™.

Dream Lucidity

In this paper, the authors examine digital environments as a learning spaces and site of extended cognition by demonstrating the presence of active learning in both video games and their linked online collaborative communities. The authors use Shaun Gallagher's theory of extended mind to posit the notion that the shared cognitive space created in the game between creator and player can be extend to include many others through the digital communities of those players though gaming literacy. The authors conducted a think-aloud protocol with participants playing Yume Nikki, a minimalist Japanese indie game, then reading materials on hikikomori, a condition the creator is believed to have. They conclude from their results that active and creative learning of human communities should not be undervalued when designing virtual environments even when the environment is single-player.

Gaming Privacy: a Canadian case study of a children’s co-created privacy literacy game

This paper reports the process and outcomes of the design of a game that educates children about management of privacy online. Using a participatory action research process, children worked with the researchers to develop and play a game which simulates certain aspects of online privacy management and allows for scaffolded experiential learning in a safe environment. The game allows children to develop autonomous skills and understandings, not only for more effective learning but also because it is only through autonomy that children can develop a sense of self which is necessary for understanding what it means to be private. The paper shows that children have quite sophisticated understandings of privacy, compared with some adult perceptions, and that these understandings include awareness of the risks posed by commercial organisations seeking to gather personal data from them. The paper shows how engaging children as research and design participants can lead to more successful approaches in the development of privacy literacy.

Improving Writing Literacies through Digital Gaming Literacies: Facebook Gaming in the Composition Classroom

Abstract Composition continually evolves as new technologies emerge and newer generations transform digital literacies. As the concept of literacies is being defined and redefined by the technologies our students use, we as instructors can tap into this resource to engage students in the excitement of writing. Through digital literacies, students are networking and learning to match social mediums to the information they generate and audiences they address. I propose the integration of gaming and composition as a way to develop students’ writing practices. In this article, I show how areas of composition—such as engagement, problem solving, collaboration, and audience—connect to the Facebook gaming world. Through the use of gaming in composition instruction, we can build bridges between students’ interests and help them develop scholarly purposes of writing. Mafia Wars functions as a vehicle to further enhance students’ writing and as a way to demonstrate how gameplay contributes to what students learn in composition. Additionally, I suggest assignments that exemplify how Mafia Wars is applicable to the development of writing. By including gaming in composition, students can learn how the skills they already use in gaming are relevant to writing and develop an awareness of how they are cultivating these skills.

SEEK!: creating and crowdfunding a game-based open educational resource to improve information literacy

Crowdfunding was used for the development and production of an information literacy game, SEEK!, in 2012. The game aims to build skills around creating a search strategy and is deliberately generic and adaptable. This article outlines the reasons for using such a game for the teaching of information skills, the process of gaining funding via the crowdfunding platform Indiegogo and some future developments that build on the initial game creation and use.

Moved to learn: The effects of interactivity in a Kinect-based literacy game for beginning readers

Reading to young children has a number of benefits, including supporting the acquisition of vocabulary and literacy skills. Digital reading games, including ones with new modes of interface such as the Kinect for Xbox, may provide similar benefits in part by allowing dynamic in-game activities. However, these activities may also be distracting and detract from learning. Children (ages 5–7 years, N = 39) were randomly assigned to either i) jointly read a story with an adult, ii) have the story read by a character in a Kinect game, or iii) have the story read by a character in a Kinect game plus in-game activities. Both Kinect-Activities and Book Reading groups had significant gains for High Frequency Words, Active Decoding, and Total Reading Score, but only Kinect-Activities group had significant gain for Sight words (p < .05). Overall, these findings are encouraging for the next generation of digital literacy games.

게임접근성의 사회적 의미에 대한 연구

웹 접근성 조치 의무화 시행에 따라 웹 접근성에 대한 관심이 높아지고 있다. 웹 접근성은 장애인뿐만 아니라 비장애인을 포함하며, 사람들은 장애적 상황에 직면하게 되고, 연령이 높아 질수록 신체적 기능 저하로 인해 점진적 장애적 상황이 된다는 점에서 장애적 상황은 누구에게나 해당된다. 접근성은 보편성의 가치를 지향한다. 게임은 현대사회의 대표적 문화활동이 되고 있지만, 한국사회에서 여전히 특별한 소수문화로 인식하는 경향이 많다. 게임을 둘러싼 갈등은 게임에 대한 사회적 이해의 전제적 조건이 되는 접근성 관점에서 볼 필요가 있다. 게임접근성은 보편적 문화적 가치의 구현, 게임 리터러시 전제 조건, 새로운 비즈니스 창출, 콘텐츠접근성의 전망이란 측면에서 사회적 의미를 함축하고 있다.

Games for Learning

Advocates of digital game-based learning make the case that games can support inclusivity and equality in education because they motivate nontraditional students, promote wider access, and engage learners who are disengaged from formal education. This article will argue that this is a limited analysis which – by the very nature of its inherent assumptions – propagates stereotypical notions of the role of games in learning and could actually reduce social equality. Assumptions about and demographics of computer-game players are discussed, as are issues of gaming literacy, differences between education and entertainment games, and the impact of these on learner motivation, gender issues of game choice, and accessibility considerations. The article also addresses the methodological challenge of giving a voice to those who are disengaged in research, a particular issue in the field of games and learning. Finally, four ways in which games have the potential to promote inclusion and equality are presented and discussed.

Play and Literacy: Six-year-old Children in Elementary Education

The investigation of play and literacy was based on monitoring data of five classes of six-year-old ch ild ren fro m 2006 to 2010, and an analysis of the teaching plan: performance records of children, interviews with parents; oral testimony of children, teacher records and reports from the toy library. The data indicates the relevance of the curriculu m with activity, med iation and use of imaginary p lay and games with the support of signs and artifacts. The research found that mediation is most appropriate when there are t wo teachers for imp lementing activ ities related to the pedagogy of games for literacy. The study addresses the use of play and games in literacy for child ren of six years in the elementary school i and the analysis of the concepts of activity, play and mediat ion, under the historical-cu ltural perspective. The changes in the education system that incorporated six-year-o ld ch ildren - who previously attended pre-school at that age - into elementary school justifies the need to prepare proposals for adapting the education of these children through play and the acquisition of new knowledge that is required for entering elementary school level . The experiment was conducted by means of the collaborative work of researchers and teachers of the School of Education at the University of Sao Paulo (FEUSP) and the Application Scholl (EA) . The intention to expand the elementary school period fro m eight to nine years had already been announced in the National Education Law of Gu idelines and Bases no. 9394/96. In 2001, the National Education Plan indicated the national education goal of bringing forward the compulsory, free education to the age of six. This public policy began to be planned in 2004, and was included in the texts published in subsequent years, and 2010 was established as the limit for its deployment throughout the country. The reasoning for the expansion of primary education to nine years is based on the urgency of building an inclusive, civic, supportive and quality school for all, and on greater time spent in school(1,2,3).

Playing Games to Improve the Quality of the Sources Students Cite in their Papers

This study seeks to determine the effectiveness of the BiblioBouts information literacy game for improving the quality of the sources undergraduate students cite in their written papers. BiblioBouts was incorporated into a second-year English class of 45 students in which about half played the game from start to finish (i.e., players) and the other half failed to play all or part of the game (i.e., nonplayers). The authors hypothesized that the quality of the sources players cited in their papers would improve as a result of playing BiblioBouts and players would cite more scholarly sources in their final-paper bibliographies than nonplayers. About 90 percent of the sources players’ cited in their in-game bibliographies were scholarly sources. When players transitioned to their final papers, the percentage of scholarly sources they cited in their final papers dropped in half (44.6 percent); however, it surpassed the percentage (35.2 percent) of scholarly sources nonplayers cited in their final papers. The authors suggest that players put scholarly sources into play and cited them in their in-game bibliographies knowing that they would earn high scores for their actions. The authors also raise the question of whether the second-year students in this class and whether underclassmen generally understand scholarly sources well enough to integrate them into their papers. BiblioBouts players benefited in several other ways including being exposed to many more sources than they would have found on their own, becoming familiar with the library portal and its many available databases, and mastering citation management software for saving online sources’ citations and full-texts.

What digital games and literacy have in common: a heuristic for understanding pupils' gaming literacy

AbstractThis article argues that digital games and school‐based literacy practices have much more in common than is reported in the research literature. We describe the role digital game paratexts – ancillary print and multimodal texts about digital games – can play in connecting pupils’ gaming literacy practices to ‘traditional’ school‐based literacies still needed for academic success. By including the reading, writing and design of digital game paratexts in the literacy curriculum, teachers can actively and legitimately include digital games in their literacy instruction. To help teachers understand pupils’ gaming literacy practices in relation to other forms of literacy practices, we present a heuristic for understanding gaming (HUG) literacy. We argue our heuristic can be used for effective teacher professional development because it assists teachers in identifying the elements of gameplay that would be appropriate for the demands of the literacy curriculum. The heuristic traces gaming literacy across the quadrants of actions, designs, situations and systems to provide teachers and practitioners with a knowledge of gameplay and a metalanguage for talking about digital games. We argue this knowledge will assist them in capitalising on pupils’ existing gaming literacy by connecting their out‐of‐school gaming literacy practices to the literacy and English curriculum.

‘Grand Theft South Africa’: games, literacy and inequality in consumer childhoods

Discussions of ‘game literacy’ focus on the informal learning and literacies associated with games but seldom address the diversity in young people's gaming practices, and the highly differentiated technologies of digital gaming in use. We use available survey data to show how, in South Africa, income inequalities influence consumption patterns, shaping experiences of digital games. Two case studies of young people's play practices involving digital games in Cape Town suggest the fragmentation and inequalities of contemporary play practices and the need for a more inclusive understanding of digital gaming. Mobile phones offer more accessibility than other digital gaming platforms and local appropriations include display of micro-commodities, concealment of outdated technology, control strategies and deletion of functionality. Young people move between multiple overlapping communicative spaces and hence complex cultural articulations arise when global game narratives are appropriated to make sense of racial otherness, crime and politics in South Africa. Since educational curricula cater for highly fractured publics, we ask whether it is advisable to speak of ‘game literacy’. We suggest the need to validate less strongly mediatised forms of play, and to address diverse identification practices in consumer culture, including prestige and status as well as othering and shame.

Through a game darkly: student experiences with the technology of the library research process

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the nature of students' library‐research difficulties, especially difficulties rooted in technology, to describe how the BiblioBouts information literacy game helps students overcome these difficulties, and to discuss how BiblioBouts has evolved in order to reduce students' difficulties with the technology of the library‐research process.Design/methodology/approachData collection was multi‐modal involving quantitative instruments such as questionnaires and logs of students' game‐play activity and qualitative involving game diaries that students voluntarily completed after time they played the game, focus group interviews with students who played and did not play the game, and personal interviews with instructors before and after their students played the game.FindingsThe technology underlying the library research process is difficult to use. BiblioBouts helps students overcome their difficulties. BiblioBouts continues to evolve to enable students to reduce their difficulties with this technology.Research limitations/implicationsPlaying BiblioBouts gives students exposure to searching library databases but game play per se does not focus on searching.Practical implicationsStudents benefit from playing BiblioBouts. They gain first‐hand experience and practice with library‐research technologies such as the library portal for database selection, library databases for quality information, and Zotero for citation management. They are exposed to more sources than they would have found on their own and a logical, methodical process for evaluating the sources they find.Social implicationsOnline social gaming has been enlisted to transform library research from a solitary activity into a collaborative activity where students document their research activities and share in the research trail that individual game players leave behind.Originality/valueThe research underlines gaming's effectiveness for teaching incoming undergraduate students information literacy skills and concepts.

A Faceted Taxonomy for Rating Student Bibliographies in an Online Information Literacy Game

This study measured the quality of student bibliographies through creation of a faceted taxonomy flexible and fine-grained enough to encompass the variety of online sources cited by today’s students. The taxonomy was developed via interviews with faculty, iterative refinement of categories and scoring, and testing on example student bibliographies. It was then applied to evaluate the final bibliographies created in BiblioBouts, an online social game created to teach undergraduates information literacy skills. The scores of players and nonplayers were compared and showed a positive impact from the game. Findings of the evaluations of these student bibliographies are discussed.

Online tutoring as a pivotal quality of web-based early literacy programs.

In this randomized controlled trial, 312 low-socioeconomic-status children (M age = 52.9 months, SD = 3.2) from 15 Dutch schools participated. Children in the intervention condition played early literacy games via the intelligent tutoring system Living Letters. Control children played a nonliteracy computer game. At the beginning of each intervention session, children received instruction from computer characters about how to play the game. While playing the game, half of the children in the intervention group received individualized feedback, which included oral corrections and cues from a computer tutor. The other half of the children received no individualized feedback. On average the intervention comprised 11 sessions (approximately 110 min). A main finding was that children's code-related skills increased as a result of the Living Letters program but only when the program included a computer tutor that gave oral feedback to children's correct responses and errors. Children with underdeveloped inhibitory control scored disproportionately low in a computer environment without tutoring.

Developing the scale of Game Literacy

Developing the scale of Game Literacy