One year ago this month, its 3rd-through-6th grader designers launched the fifth and final iteration of Escape to Morrow, an open source digital game they designed in Minecraft for Minecraft players. The five iterations – including writing and rewriting backstories, creating maps, finding mods (Minecraft modifications out on the Web) and producing the trailer – took a year of work in summer camp, … [Read more...] about For digital summer camp, kid-source a game (or play this one!)
Search Results for: Safety by design
The videogame discourse: Default to open-mindedness!
My heart sinks when I see uncritical thinking in commentaries from Internet safety advocates about the media young people love – thinking that defaults (and contributes to a society-level default) to fear that new media's harmful and young users are either potential victims or up to no good. Take videogames, for example. We know that… "Videogame play is pervasive throughout our society," as … [Read more...] about The videogame discourse: Default to open-mindedness!
Cross-cultural in so many ways: Insights from ‘Digitally Connected’
It was a small but mighty gathering at Harvard's Berkman Center this week – mighty in diversity of geographical, personal and professional perspective (40% of the participants were from the global South). It was called "Digitally Connected," but it was about a more inclusive and, I think, more lasting, holistic sense of what "connected" means. It was co-organized by UNICEF and Harvard University's … [Read more...] about Cross-cultural in so many ways: Insights from ‘Digitally Connected’
A teacher on what teaching in Minecraft looks like
No need to leave connected learning to the imagination. Well, sort of – plenty is left to students' imaginations! Teacher Jacqui Murray in southern California spells out in a blog post exactly how she uses Minecraft for students to work on reading comprehension, writing and problem-solving. She agrees with New Jersey K-8 teacher Marianne Malmstrom on what makes Minecraft so great for learning: … [Read more...] about A teacher on what teaching in Minecraft looks like
Factors in good policymaking about youth & digital media
Informed citizens sometimes forget that the reason why negative, tragic or just plain-old bad news is news is because it's the exception to the rule. That's why it's newsworthy. And this is true whether we're hearing about airplane crashes or online bullying. Sometimes the news is unspeakably tragic, but it's still the exception, not the rule. It's not an event from which we can extrapolate what … [Read more...] about Factors in good policymaking about youth & digital media