Perhaps the most fundamental property of a constructivist learning environment is
that it offers a context for student learning.
Context-embedded learning has been a cornerstone of the constructivist
movement since at least the early 1900’s. Now, nearly a century later, video games and
simulations can offer new contexts for student learning that would not have been
available to students in the past. Video games are able to provide students with a context
that allows them to learn by doing, remain in a state of flow, explore microworlds that
allow easy transfer of learning, develop situated and distributed understanding, exercise
new identities, and benefit from role-playing.
Learning By Doing
While traditional teaching and learning tends to be a passive experience for the
student who receives knowledge from the teacher, constructivist pedagogy emphases
learning by doing, learning from experience, and problem solving in context. In order to
learn by doing, a student must not simply read from a textbook or listen to a lecture.
Rather, the student must engage authentic (or real-world) problems in their authentic
context.
Dewey (1915), for instance, felt that school work was “remote and shadowy
compared with the training of attention and of judgment that is acquired in having to do
things with a real motive behind and a real outcome ahead” (p. 12). He later noted that
“one trouble [with traditional education] is that the subject-matter in question was learned
in isolation” (1938, p. 48). Dewey (1915) was much more interested in students “having a
part to do in constructive work” (p. 17). Consequently, he called for each student to be
“given, wherever possible, intellectual responsibility for selecting the materials and
instruments that are most fit, and given an opportunity to think out his own model and
plan of work, led to perceive his own errors, and find out how to correct them” (p. 133134). He believed that “thinking... arises from the need of meeting some difficulty, in
reflecting upon the best way of over coming it, and thus… planning [and] projecting
mentally the results to be reached, and deciding upon the steps necessary and their serial
order” (p. 135).
Bruner (1966), too, urged educators to “consider education and school learning in
their situated, cultural context” (p. x). He believed that “in a [traditional] detached school,
what is imparted often has little to do with life as lived in the society” (1966, p. 152). He
was interested more in history as a discipline than as a curriculum and he believed “it is a
lame excuse to say children can’t do it” (Bruner, 1996, p. 91). Invoking Piaget’s little
scientist, he also expressed that “learning to be a scientist is not the same as 'learning
science': it is learning a culture, with all the attendant 'non-rational' meaning making that
goes with it” (Bruner, 1996, p. 132). Ultimately, Bruner was interested in “knowing as
doing” (p. 150) and “understanding by doing something other than just taking” (p. 151).
Modern video game scholars have argued that video and computer games can
help provide such a context for learning. Prensky (2001), for instance, highlighted several
relevant concepts; games have rules, goals, outcomes/feedback,
conflict/competition/challenge/opposition, problem solving, interaction, representation,
and story (p. 106), including character (p. 134, 118-127). Regarding goals specifically,
Prensky suggests elsewhere that the goals must be “worthwhile” (2005a, p. 9), or
specifically “worth it to [students]” (2005, p. 4), to be effective. When he covers game
design, he considers the way in which a game must be balanced so that “the game is
neither too hard nor too easy at any point” (Prensky, 2001, p. 133). A well-designed
game, particularly an RPG or MMORPG, can also include elements of exploration and
discovery as well (p. 136). In his projection of the future of digital games, Prensky (2001)
predicts that games will be “much more realistic, experiential, and immersive” and
include “more and better storytelling and characters” (p. 404).
Prensky later wrote about five levels of learning by doing. The first of these was
the How level; as Prensky (2006) explained, “the most explicit kind of learning in video
and computer games is how to do something” (p. 64). The second level is learning What
to do (and what not to do) in any particular instance (p. 65). The third level of learning is
the Why level; “strategy – the why of a game – depends on, and flows from, the rules” (p.
67). Why lessons include cause and effect, long term wining versus short term goals,
order from seeming chaos, second-order consequences, complex system behaviors,
counter intuitive results, using obstacles as motication, and the value of persistence (p.
67-68). The fourth level, Where “is the context level, which encompasses the huge
amount of cultural and environmental learning that goes on in video and computer
games” (Prensky, 2006, p. 68). Finally, there is the Whether level, in which “players
learn to make value-based and moral decisions – decisions about whether doing
something is right or wrong” (p. 69).
Like Prensky, Gee discussed ways in which video games can provide a context
for learning. Gee (2003), a linguist and cognitive scientist asserted that “words, symbols,
images, and artifacts have meanings that are specific to… particular situations (contexts)”
(p. 24). He argued that a good game can provide a “context within which to understand
and make sense of what one is going to do” (Gee, 2004, p. 64). He also suggested that
“the theory of learning in good video games is close to… the best theories of learning in
cognitive science” (Gee, 2003, p. 7).
Gee (2003) focused on the way that video games can provide a learning
environment that is “set up to encourage active and critical, not passive, learning” (p. 49).
He believed that active critical learning was based on experiencing (seeing, feeling, and
operating on) the world in new ways (p. 23), and on being able to not only “understand
and produce meanings” in the domain being learned, but also being able to “think about
the domain at a ‘meta’ level as a complex system of interrelated parts” (p. 23).
Even at a more basic level, Gee (2003) believed that “basic skills are not learned
in isolation or out of context; rather… a basic skill is discovered bottom up by engaging
with the domain” (p. 137). Gee also suggested that learners should get “lots of practice in
a context where the practice is not boring (i.e. in a virtual world that is compelling to
learners on their own terms and where the learners experience ongoing success)” (p. 71).
Gee offered the following recipe for providing students with a context for
learning.
“The recipe is simple: Give people well designed visual and embodied
experiences of a domain, through simulations or in reality (or both). Help them
use these experience to build simulations in their heads through which they can
think about and imaginatively test out future actions and hypotheses. Let them act
and experience consequences, but in a protected way when they are learners. Then
help hem to evaluate their actions and the consequences of their actions (based on
the values and identities they have adopted as participants in the domain) in ways
that lead them to build better simulations for better future action. Though this
recipe could be a recipe for teaching science in a deep way, it is [also] a recipe for
an engaging and fun game. It should be the same in school.” (Gee, 2005, p. 63)
Gee (2005a) also expected good games to allow learners to practice skills “until
they are nearly automatic, then [to have] those skills fail in ways that cause the learners to
have to think again and learn anew” (p. 27) in cycles of expertise. In addition, virtual
contexts can provide a greater amplification of input for the learner; in other words, “for a
little input, learners get a lot of output” (Gee, 2003, p. 67). Because of these elements,
and because of the tireless replayability of a game (as opposed to a teacher who may
quickly tire of explaining things more than once), games can offer learners “a context
where the practice is not boring” (p. 71) so that “they spend lots of time on task” (p. 71).
Learners should also be given “ample opportunity to practice, and support for,
transferring what they have learned earlier to later problems, including problems that
require adapting and transforming that earlier learning” (p. 138).
Aldrich (2005) quotes Will Thalheimer on the role of context in simulations:
“The first thing that makes simulations work is context alignment. The
performance situation is similar to the learning situation… when the learners enter
a real situation, you want the environment to trigger the learning. That results in a
10 to 50 percent learning impact” (Will Thalheimer, as quoted in Aldrich, 2005,
p. 84).
When Aldrich (2004) discussed the objectives of designing an interface system
for a simulation, his most important points were that a simulation interface should
“represent the actual activity at some level” (p. 173) and “be a part of the learning” (p.
174) in the sense that simply learning the interface would help a user learn about the
subject being learned. Though he advocated for keeping a simulation interface simple and
streamlined (p. 175), he was interested in fidelity where it impacted learning. He
suggested that a simulation interface should operate in real time such that “all options are
available all the time”(p. 175). Similarly, he called for simulation design that, like the real
world, included all three types of content, linear, cyclical, and open-ended (p. 99). He
also opposed simulations that presented the world as it should be rather than as it is, even
if this is done in the name of political correctness (p. 215).
Shaffer (2004), too, noted that “new technologies make it easier for students to
learn about the world by participating in meaningful activity” (p. 1403). He tied this
directly to constructivist tradition, saying that “new technologies support Dewey’s vision
of bringing the ‘life of the child’ into an environment for learning” (p. 1404). Shaffer
aimed to apply the following philosophy to the design of educational video games:
"pedagogical praxis seeks to create environments that are thickly authentic.
Resnick and I (Shaffer & Resnick, 1999) argued that authenticity is an alignment
between activities and some combination of (a) goals that matter to the
community outside of the classroom, (b) goals that are personally meaningful to
the student, (c) ways of thinking within an established domain, and (d) the means
of assessment. Thickly authentic learning environments create all of these
alignments simultaneously. For example, in the case of pedagogical praxis, when
personally meaningful projects are produced and assessed according to the
epistemological and procedural norms of an external community of practice."
(Shaffer, 2004, p. 1406)
Shaffer’s epistemic games “are about having students do things that matter in the
world by immersing them in rigorous professional practices of innovation” (Shaffer &
Gee, 2005, p. 12). As Shaffer and Gee explain, “in this approach, students do things that
have meaning to them and to society, supported all along the way by structure, and lots of
it—structure that leads to expertise, professional-like skills, and an ability to innovate”
(p. 12). They point out that “the key step in developing the epistemic frame of most
communities of innovation is in some form of professional practicum… environments in
which a learner acts in a supervised setting and then reflects on the results of his or her
action with peers and mentors” (p. 14), and they aimed to use video games to provide this
practicum. In such epistemic games “students learn facts and content in the context of
innovative ways of thinking and working… in a way that sticks, because they learn in the
process of doing things that matter” (p. 24). Such epistemic games exemplify the learnby-doing philosophy. In these games, “students were learning to solve real problems by
working on real problems, learning how to think about things that matter in the world by
actually doing things that matter in the world” (Shaffer, 2006, p. 6).
Shaffer (2006) argues that “video games can change education because computers
now make it possible to learn on a massive scale by doing the things that people do in the
world outside of school” (p. 9). Citing Gee’s principle of performance before
competence, Shaffer (2006) explains that with video games students can “learn by doing
rather than learning first and doing later” (p. 68), and that the “difference… between
declarative knowledge and procedural knowledge, or being able to explain something and
being able to actually do it – is fundamental to education as we know it” (p. 92). Again
invoking Dewey, Shaffer state that “the process of moving from interest to
understanding, according to Dewey, was learning by doing – or, to be more precise,
learning by trying to do something, making mistakes, and then figuring out how to fix
them” (p. 124). Because epistemic games can “develop professional skills, knowledge,
and epistemology in the context of professional values,” Shaffer suggests that, “epistemic
games are thus a potentially important part of children’s development” (p. 132).
Several other scholars have demonstrated the value of video games in providing a
learning context. Like Shaffer, Squire and Jenkins (2003) advocate the use of games “in
conjunction with real-world simulations” (p. 9). They also noted that “students learning
in the context of solving complex problems not only retain more information but tend to
perform better in solving problems” (p. 28). Holland, Jenkins, and Squire (2003)
explained that “embedding challenges within the tool requires users to actively monitor
their performance, observing, hypothesizing, acting, and reflecting” (p. 37). As they point
out, “In addition to being potentially more motivating for learners, engaging in such
critical thinking processes is generally thought to be the basis of meaningful learning...
knowledge developed in the context of solving problems is typically recalled better than
knowledge learned by rote and more readily mobilized for solving problems in novel
contexts” (p. 37). Video games that can exercise such thinking processes “give students a
sense of the practice for which they’re being trained” (p. 40).
McMahan (2003) also discussed the value of the presence and immersion offered
by video games (p. 68-77). And, as Filiciak (2003) expressed it, players “desire the
experience of immersion, so we use our intelligence to reinforce rather than to question
the reality of the experience” (p. 99), a factor that can work both for and against the
instructional goals of video games.
Flow
Ideally, the student in an environment where they can learn by doing will be
challenged without being frustrated, and thus remain in a state of flow, an ideal state of
learning (or performance). Csikszentmihalyi (1997) described flow experiences as
“exceptional moments” (p. 29) that tend to occur “when a person's skills are fully
involved in overcoming a challenge that is just about manageable… a fine balance
between one's ability to act, and the available opportunities for action” (p. 30). This bears
resemblance to Vygotsky’s (1978) Zone of Proximal Development, which also describes
the way in which students learn when challenged just beyond the horizon of their
mastery, but not so far beyond that they become frustrated. Early in his description of the
optimal experiences that generate flow states, Csikszentmihalyi (1997) noted that “it is
easy to enter flow in games” (p. 29), at least in part because games, like other flow
activities, “provide immediate feedback” (p. 30).
Videogames, in particular, are designed to provide individualized levels of
challenge and feedback for players. Shaffer (2006) made the connection between video
games and Csikszentmihalyi’s work, pointing out that “we learn best when working on
things that are neither too easy nor too hard” (p.125). Shaffer went on to point out that, as
Dewey suggested “the obstacles have to be relevant to the thing you are trying to do:
They have to push back on issues that are related to the task at hand, rather than being
something irrelevant or extraneous that you have to overcome in order to keep working”
(p. 125). Relevance, which is treated in more detail below, is key to the use of flow
experiences for learning – and needs to be present in educational games. Massively
multiplayer online roleplaying games (MMORPGs) are a medium in which such
relevance might be easily incorporated; as Steinkuehler (2004b) points out, in an
MMORGP “information is given ‘just in time,’ always in the context of the goal-driven
activity that it’s actually useful for – and made meaningful by – and always at a time
when it can be immediately put to use” (p. 7), thus facilitating playing and learning in a
state of flow.
Microworlds
In order to support student’s early efforts, the learning context can be a
microworld, or simplified version, of the real-world context in which similar skills might
be used – and to which students’ new skills will eventually be expected to transfer.
Microworlds model only the elements of the experience that are important to a student’s
developmental level, while limiting other distractions.
Papert (1980) originated the concept of microworlds as incubators for knowledge
(p. 120). This concept of microworlds stems from Papert’s belief “that learning physics
consists of bringing physics knowledge into contact with very diverse personal
knowledge, [and that] to do this we should allow the learner to construct and work with
transitional systems that the physicist may refuse to recognize as physics” (p 122).
Microworlds, then, can be considered simply “transitional systems.” Papert explores a set
of criteria for creating microworlds. The first of these is that the design should be very
simple and accessible (p. 126). It must also offer the “possibility of activities, games, art,
and so on… to make the activity in microworlds matter” (p. 126). Finally, microworlds
should be designed such that “all needed concepts can be defined within the experience
of that world” (p. 126). Later, Papert (1993) explained a Microworlds as “simple,
restricted worlds” (p. 56) that are “limited enough to be thoroughly explored and
completely understood” (p. 59). “In an analogy between ideas and people,” he explained
that “microworlds are the worlds of people we know intimately and well” (p. 59).
Jonassen (2000) described microworlds as “primarily exploratory environments,
discovery spaces, and constrained simulations of real-world phenomena in which learners
can navigate, manipulate or create objects, and test their effects on one another” (p. 157).
He also made the observation that “video-based adventure games are microworlds that
require players to master each environment before moving onto more complex
environments” (p. 157). In Jonassen’s description, a well-designed microworld is one in
which “instruction proceeds from simple to complex skills” (p. 159), and the environment
exploits “the interest and curiosity of the learner” (p. 159). Microworlds should also be
“simple, so they can be understood, general, so they apply to many areas of life, useful,
so the ideas are important to learners in the world, and syntonic (resonant with one’s
experience), so learners can relate them to prior experience” (p. 159). These elements
may be what some games lack, and making these judgments will be one of the challenges
of creating good educational games or simulations to serve as microworlds.
The goal of a microworld, according to Papert (1980), is to help students “get a
feel for why the world works as it does” rather than “to establish a given truth” as the
goal would be in traditional pedagogy (p. 129). Papert points out that “we learned how to
build and use theories only because we were allowed to hold ‘deviant’ views… for many
years” (p. 132). In microworlds, unlike in most schools, false theories are tolerated (p.
132). Learning in microworlds is also product-oriented, such that the child is learning
new concepts “as a means to get to a creative and personally defined end” (p. 134).
Perhaps most importantly, children are able to practice bricolage, or tinkering, and to
become bricoleurs, or tinkerers (p. 173, 175, 223), when learning in a microworld.
The advantages of microworlds are many, and their disadvantages few. Jonassen
(2000) considers microworlds to be environments that “encourage active participation”
(p. 168), “provide instruction that is situated in rich, meaningful settings” (p. 169), and
“support self-regulated learning” (p. 169). However, “their openness can be frustrating at
first” (p. 169), and overcoming this may require students to acquire skills they do not
posses.
Microworlds can be an example of what Prensky (2006) calls a complex game (p.
58). In his discussion of Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants, Prensky (2006)
describes Digital Immigrant’s games as trivial pursuits (or mini-games), except for a few
exceptions, such as “chess, go, strategy games, and Dungeons and Dragons” (p. 55).
Complex games:

“Can take from 8 to over 100 hours to complete.

Require players to learn a wide variety of often new and difficult skills and
strategies, and to master these skills and strategies by advancing through
dozens of ever-harder levels.

May require both outside research and collaboration with others while
playing.

Often require players to assume alternate identities.

Frequently present players with ethical dilemmas or life-and-death decisions.

Often take from 20-60 hours to master.

Include just about very electronic game that comes in a box, either for a PC or
a console (PlayStation, Game Cube, or XBox), a well as many that are made
for handheld devices such as GameBoys. Most simulation games (Sim City,
Airport Tycoon, etc.), history strategy games (Civilization III and Rise of
Nations), military strategy games, and sports games are complex games.”
(Prensky, 2006, p. 58)
However, just as not all video games are microworlds, Prensky (2006) cautions
that not all video games are complex; “One-on-one arcade-type fighting games such as
Virtua Fighter and other similar ones are just glorified mini-games" (Prensky, 2006, p.
59). It is the adaptability, worthwhile goals, and meaningful decision making that keeps
kids playing complex games despite their relative difficulty (p. 60-63), and Prensky
believes that “complex games, already educating our kids after school, also have the
potential to be a huge boon to formal education” (p. 63).
If one of the benefits of games is that they can provide an authentic context for
student tasks, they can also provide support within this context, such that “learning even
at its start takes place in a (simplified) subset of the real domain” (Gee, 2003, p. 137).
This Gee (2003) called the Subset Principle (p. 137), and later “fish tanks” (2004, p. 61
and 2005a, p. 27), “supervised fish tanks” (2004, p. 65), “supervised sandboxes” (p. 66),
“unsupervised sandboxes” (p. 70), and simply “sandboxes” (2005a, p. 27), but this might
have been called a microworld by Papert and others. In a well-designed microworld,
learners will see, “especially early on, many more instances of fundamental signs and
actions than would be the case in a less controlled [context]” (Gee, 2003, p. 137).
In the tradition of Papert’s microworlds, Aldrich (2004), too, is interested in the
way “simulations describe small worlds” (p. 152) as a context for learning. The
simulation he designed, Virtual Leader, provides a microworld in which players learn
about leadership, a skill that is typically difficult to teach (and assess) in a traditional
classroom environment.
Shaffer offered several other examples of video games providing a microworld
(or part of a microworld) in which students can learn and pursue meaningful goals. He
was explicitly interested in “computational microworlds, which Hoyles, Noss, and
Adamson (2002) define as 'environments where people can explore and learn from what
they receive back from the computer in return for their exploration' (p. 30)” (Shaffer,
2005, p. 18). Shaffer (2006) later noted that “Every computer program creates a world:
what Seymour Papert and others have called a Microworld” (p. 67). One example was an
epistemic game called Escher’s World, in which students take on the role of a designer in
training and in which a computer program called Geometer’s Sketchpad creates a
mathematical microworld in which students can complete their designs (p. 84). In another
epistemic game called Science.net, students “write using a journalism microworld whose
features push back on specific elemsnts of writing to formula and writing as a watchdog”
(p. 152). Each of the other epistemic games Shaffer discussed, including The Debating
Game, Digital Zoo, The Pandora Project, and Urban Science also provide students with a
microworld in which to learn by doing and thus practice thinking, acting, and innovating
like a professional. Like Prensky, Shaffer believed that the “video games… of children’s
culture today demand strategic thinking, technical language, and sophisticated problemsolving skills” (p. 6). And, in the tradition of Dewey, he believed that video games can
provide a “simulated ‘world of hard conditions’” (p. 127).
Another example similar to Shaffer’s epistemic games, is Supercharged!, a game
discussed by Holland, Jenkins, and Squire (2003). They explain that “games present
players microworlds; games offer players (students) contexts for thinking through
problems, making their own actions part of the solution, building on their intuitive sense
of their role in the game-world” (p. 28). The game was based on the concept that:
"students have difficulty grasping core concepts of elctromagnatism because they
run counter to their own real world experiences, yet playing a game that requires
mastery of those principles in order to win may give them an intuitive grasp of
how they work that can be more fully developed in the classroom" (Holland,
Jenkins, and Squire, 2003, p. 35).
Even so, they “do not believe that Supercharged! will ever replace Physics
teachers, textbooks, or other educational materials. Rather, Supercharged! can be used as
an instructional tool or resource within a broader pedagogical framework" (Holland,
Jenkins, and Squire, 2003, p. 36).
There are many ways in which even commercial off the shelf video games can
serve as valuable microworlds for learning. Shaffer, Squire, and Gee (2005) explained
that “video games are important because they let people participate in new worlds” (p.
105). Also, as Jenkins, Klopfer, Squire, and Tan (2003) explained, games can be
“motivating and authentic” without being “dangerous and expensive” (p. 7). Furthermore,
video games allow learners to “manipulate otherwise unalterable variables… [and] view
phenomena from new perspectives” (Squire, 2003, p. 6). Ideally, a game used as an
educational microworld will be similar to MIT’s Revolution, in which “the game world is
big enough so that each student can play an important part, [and yet] small enough that
their actions matter in shaping what happens” (Squire & Jenkins, 2003, p. 16). While it
seems that role playing games, and in particular multiplayer games, can fit this bill, it is
debatable whether or not MMORPGs are appropriate in this respect. Still, MMORPGs
may be some of the best commercial examples of microworlds. As Steinkuehler (2005b)
pointed out, “MMOGaming is participation in a multimodal, and digital textual place” (p.
98). She also explained that “within video games… the reader becomes or inhabits a
symbol, enabling him or her to interact with signs as if they are the very things they
represent” (p. 99), a property of video games that supports learners in transferring new
skills to other environments.
Transfer
The transfer of skills from a learning situation to a real-world scenario is one of
the goals of any educational system. Shaffer (2006) wrote that “impacts that transfer form
one context to another are, in some sense, the holy grail of education, and certainly the
ultimate goal in the development of educational games” (p. 157). Slator (2006) expressed
this mandate by writing that “students who learn through simulations should acquire
content-related concepts and skills as a consequence of playing the game, and this
learning should transfer to knowledge contexts outside the game” (p. 4). In a serious
game, such as biohazard, “understanding is to be performed in certain contexts”
(Holland, Jenkins, and Squire, 2003, p. 38), and “games such as Escher’s World can
accomplish, in a very general but very important sense, the elusive educational goal of
producing worthwhile effects that transfer from one context to another” (Shaffer, in press,
p. 4). Specifically, in the case of Escher’s World, “students were able to use the practices
of the design studio to transfer the epistemic framework of developing and defending
expressive solutions to open-ended problems from graphic design to mathematics”
(Shaffer, 2004a, p. 1411). Pillay (2005) also established that skills acquired in a computer
game do transfer to other similar activities, though the games and activities he studied
were comparatively unsophisticated.
In any case, while this sort of transfer may be the goal of any educational game, it
is important to note that a game alone is unlikely to reliably produce this effect. As
Squire (2002) warned:
“playing Civilization might be a tool that can assist students in understanding
social studies, but playing the game is not necessarily participating in historical,
political, or geographical analysis. Therefore, building on our earlier discussion of
transfer, there is very good reason to believe that students may not use their
understandings developed in the game - such as the political importance of a
natural resource like oil - as tools for understanding phenomena outside the game,
such the economics behind The Persian Gulf War or contemporary foreign policy,
even in a game as rich as Civilization III” (Squire, 2002, p. 9).
The role of the teacher in supporting the development of student understanding
remains important when games are used in formal education. (The role of the teacher will
be addressed in greater detail in a later section.
Situated and Distributed Understanding
Learning that happens within a microworld (or other authentic context) is what
constructivists consider situated learning, and allows students to develop a situated
understanding of the skills they are developing and problems they are solving. Bruner
(1996) believed that all knowledge is “always ‘situated,’ dependent upon materials, task,
and how the learner [understands] things” (p. 132). Duffy and Jonassen (1992) also
explained that constructivists “emphasize ‘situating’ cognitive experiences in authentic
activities” (p. 4). Phrased another way, they believed that “we must aid the individual in
working with the concept in the complex environment, thus helping him or her to see the
complex interrelationships and dependencies” (p. 8). It is significant, especially in terms
of microworlds and educational technologies, that they point out “the context need not be
the real world of work in order for it to be authentic… rather, the authenticity arises from
engaging in the kinds of tasks using the kids of tools that are authentic to that domain” (p.
9).
In the constructivist tradition, Gee (2003) argued that learning involves situating
(or building) meanings in context, and that “video games are particularly good places
where people can learn to situate meanings through embodied experiences” (p. 26). He
highlighted examples in which “the player (learner) is immersed in a world of action and
learns through experience, though this experience is guided or scaffolded by information
the player is given and the very design of the game itself” (Gee, 2005, p. 59). Gee (2003)
understood that “meaning and knowledge are built up through various modalities
(images, text, symbols, interactions, abstract design, sound, etc.)” (p. 111), which video
games can provide in spades.
Many scholars believe that video games and simulations can provide
environments in which such situated learning can occur. Shaffer, Squire, Halverson, and
Gee (2005), for example, stated that “the virtual worlds of games are powerful because
they make it possible to develop situated understanding” (p. 106) and that “video games
take advantage of situated learning environments” (p. 108). When discussing the new
ways in which a student engaged with her world after playing the epistemic game
Madison 2200, the authors wrote that “this is situated learning at its most profound – a
transfer of ideas from one context to another that is elusive, rare, and powerful” (p. 109).
Later Shaffer (2006) wrote about a journalism class (J-828) that inspired the epistemic
game Science.net; “As the situated view of learning suggests, novice journalists in J-828
learned by becoming members of a community, and they came to see themselves as
members of the community by learning to do things that members of the community do”
(p. 148). Dede (2005), too, found that learning situated in virtual environments and
augmented realities was important because of the capacity for transfer of learning to real
problems. Steinkuehler, who studied MMORPGs specifically, was also interested in “the
situated meanings individuals construct, the definitive role of communities in that
meaning, and the inherently ideological nature of both” (p. 17).
Just as they may provide students an opportunity for situated learning, many
microworlds (and other authentic contexts) offer opportunities for students to developed a
distributed understanding of skills and problems. Unlike in traditional testing situations,
students do not need to memorize all of the answers to their problems and information
required in the learning context. They can call upon tools and other individuals within the
context to aid them in their efforts. As Bruner (1996) expressed it, intelligence is “not
simply 'in the head' but [is] 'distributed' in the person's world - including the toolkit of
reckoning devices and heuristics and accessible friends that the person could call upon...
intelligence, in a word, reflects a micro-culture of praxis" (p. 132). Gee (2003) considered
this one of the principles of good learning that many good video games do well; in good
games “thinking, problem solving, and knowledge are ‘stored’ in material objects and the
environment” (p. 111).
Identity
As students develop situated and distributed understanding within a learning
context, they are essentially exploring an identity within that context – a way of acting
and thinking that is specific to the context and problems at hand. Constructivist educators
purposefully and explicitly support the development of educationally beneficial identities
by their students. Some modern constructivists strive to help students develop
professional identities that may be useful in their adult future, particularly professional
identities that emphasize sophisticated or innovative ways of thinking, doing, and
problem solving.
Shaffer, Squire, and Gee (2005) believed that “the virtual worlds of games are
rich contexts for learning because they make it possible for players to experiment with
new and powerful identities” (p. 106). Shaffer articulates this well, with respect to his
epistemic games:
“the ability of students to incorporate epistemic frames into their identities (or
portfolio of potential identities) suggests a mechanism through which sufficiently
rich experiences in technology-supported simulations of real-world practices
(such as the games described above) may help students deal more effectively with
situations in the real-world and in school subjects beyond the scope of the
interactive environment itself.” (Shaffer, in press, p. 19)
Gee (2003) was most interested in the way that good games can facilitate learning
by requiring players to take on a new identity and form “bridges from [their] old
identities to the new one” (p. 51). He felt that “all deep learning – that is active, critical
learning – is inextricably caught up with identity” (p. 51), and he tapped into the tradition
of Piaget’s little scientists when he offered the example of “a child in a science classroom
engaged in real inquiry, and not passive learning, [who] must be willing to take on an
identity as a certain type of scientific thinker, problem solver, and doer” (p. 51). This
concept he extended to the many roles that students might play in good role-playing
video games, which he reported made him “think new thoughts about what [he as a
player] valued and what [he] did not” (p. 56). He suggested that game designers and
teachers “need to create a game-like biology world in which learners can act and decide
as certain types of biologists” (Gee, 2005, p. 85) in order to help students become
“authentic professionals [with] specific knowledge and distinctive values tied to specific
skills gained though a good deal of effort and experience” (p. 51). Gee felt that good
games can facilitate learning that “involves taking on and playing with identities in such a
way that the learner has real choices” (p. 67).
Citing Gee, Shaffer (in press) identified three levels of identity that can be
developed in a game: “the real identity of the player… the virtual identity of the character
or role the player has in the game… [and] a third projective identity, which is the kind of
character the player wants to be in the game” (p. 19). He also discusses the importance of
developing possible selves in a game; “possible selves give form to a person’s hopes for
mastery, power, status, or belonging, and to a person’s fears of incompetence, failure, and
rejection” (Shaffer, 2006, p. 158). With his epistemic games, Shaffer aims to “give
adolescents new possible selves that are based on authentic experiences with innovative
thinking that matter in the world” (p. 158). This experience can also extend to selves that
are impossible in the real world. As Lahti illustrated, “this becomes a safe way [for
players] to try on being a different race or sex” (p. 168). Steinkeuher (2006a) studied the
nuanced development of such new identities in MMORPGs in particular (both in and out
of game identities), suggesting that MMORPGs too might be a medium in which students
might develop meaningful new identities.
Role Playing
One particularly powerful strategy for supporting this sort of identity development
is to facilitate true role-playing experiences for students, in which each student takes on a
specific role within a cognitively immersive environment. Story telling, especially in
conjunction with student role-playing, can also be a powerful tool.
Jonassen, Peck, and Wilson (1999) discussed “Role-Playing on the Web” (p. 33)
and the creation of web-based simulations and games; they were especially interested in
the promise of new technologies to allow even “elementary students [to] build simple to
complex microworlds” (p. 33). Role-playing appeared again in their discussion of
visualizing with technology when they suggested that students might “role play press
conference(s)” (p. 66). This theme recurred yet again in their treatment of learning by
constructing realities with hypermedia, where they shared a handful of examples of
“anchoring instruction in hypermedia learning environments” (p. 92), which provide a
scenario for the student to explore and play.
Jonassen, Peck, and Wilson (1999) also mentioned the promise of text based
MUDs (Multi-User Dungeons, and later Multi-User Domains) and MOOs (Object
Oriented MUDs) as a powerful role-playing context for students (p. 140), where students
can “can assume a virtual persona different from their real-world persona” (p. 141).
These environments were also associated with “facilitat[ing] dialogue and knowledge
building among the community of learners” (p. 200). Although “children enjoyed
opportunities to choose their own paths through the environment, with some eventually
learning to construct their own rooms and environments” (p. 141), there were some
potential drawbacks to the use of these games in education; “boys seemed to show more
interest than girls… [and] older children (11-14) participated more than younger
children” (p. 141). Modern Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPGs) are
direct descendents of these early text based games, and may share some of the same
potentials and drawbacks.
Jonassen (2003) also this compelling vision of MUDs in the classroom, a vision
that applies as much or even more so to modern MMORPGs:
“Imagine, for instance, a MUD in which a student is placed on the main street in a
small community in colonial America, with the option of entering stores,
blacksmith shops, pubs, jails, homes, and other buildings of the period. Inside
each building would be descriptions of the people and artifacts it contained.
Students would make decisions and express their choices, to which the MUD’s
characters and objects (and other students) would react. Imagine, too, that
teachers and their classes could work together to develop new buildings. This
option (which is often provided in MUDs) could be great incentive for research,
collaboration, problem-solving, and other high-level activities.” (p. 104)
These environments (MUDs or MMORPGs) also make natural microworlds,
which Jonassen (2003) is still concerned with. Central to his philosophy is his belief that
“transfer of learning, particularly higher order kinds of learning, requires well-developed
mental models” (p. 190) and that “in order to construct mental models, learners must
explore and manipulate phenomenon, observe the effects, and generate mental
representations of those phenomena” (p. 190). This can occur in MMORPGs if they
adhere to the four essential characteristics of a microworld, as Jonassen interprets Papert:

“simple to understand

reflects generic characteristics that can be applied to many areas of life

presents concepts and ideas that are useful and important to learners in the world

reflects syntonic characteristics, which allow learners to relate prior knowledge
and experience to current phenomenon being studied” (p. 191)
Jonassen later added the following:

“Provides a meaningful learning context that supports intrinsically motivated and
self-regulated learning

Establishes a pattern whereby the learner goes from the “known to the unknown”

Provides a balance between deductive and inductive learning

Emphasizes the usefulness of errors

Anticipates and nurtures incidental learning” (p. 193)
In addition to the above, MMORPGs, like other games in general, “can embed
cognitive, social, and cultural factors within the environment… which can help learners
transfer skills from play and imitation to real situations that they will experience”
(Jonassen, 2003, p. 191). Those that allow user creation within the game environment can
tap into the idea that “the creation process is an important component of learning (Papert,
1980), which is supported with students constructing their understanding of a
phenomenon in a microworld” (Jonassen, 2003, p. 197). Jonassen also points out that “as
is the case with most instructional design projects, the people who learn the most are the
designers and developers, not the target audience” (p. 191). With respect to virtual reality
environments, which modern MMORPGs provide, Jonassen also suggests that active
decision-making in the environment “gives students the feeling of participating in a realworld environment, and also transforms learning into exploration” (p. 205).
More recent game scholars add a great deal to Jonassen’s work. Squire and
Jenkins (2003) suggest that “games encourage role playing, which can… help students…
to adopt different social roles or historical subjectives” (p. 28). For example, Jenkins,
Klopfet, Squire, and Tan (2003) discuss the prototype Revolution, which “builds on… the
value of combining research and role-playing in teaching historyu, that is, the game
offers kids the chance not simply to visit a ‘living history’ museum… but to personally
experience the choices that confronted historical figures” (p. 9). Shaffer (in press)
concluded that by playing his epistemic games “students developed useful real-world
skills and understandings in computer-supported role-playing games” (p. 3).
The use of story in role-playing games can be a powerful tool for providing an
emotionally meaningful context for student actions. As Grodal (2003) wrote, “video
games are… the medium that is closes to the basic embodied experience” (p. 139). He
went on to explain that in games the story is “developed by the player’s active
particiation, and the player needs to posses a series of specific skills to ‘develop’ the
story, from concrete motor skills… to a series of planning skills” (p. 139).
Squire (2003) subscribes to the view that “interactive digital storytelling should
emerge as a legitimate art form in the upcoming years, and video games seem to be
paving the way” (p. 9). Holland, Jenkins, and Squire (2003) believe that “the heart of the
game is its dramatic force; rather than a lecture, the player is compelled by a visceral or
an emotional logic” (p. 39). Echoing core constructivist philosophy, they also note that
“rather than regurgitating context-free facts, the player [of a role playing game] must take
the next step and utilize knowledge in tense contextually rich situations” (p. 39)
Naturally, such learning does not require a computer. Shaffer (2006) shared the
example of The Debating Game, a face-to-face roll playing unit in which “students step
into the roles of debaters and judges and play by the rules that define those roles” (p. 25).
He notes that like Dungeons and Dragons, a pen and paper (tablet-top) role-playing
game, “The Debating Game is a fantasy role-playing game… in which players take on
the roles of debaters and judges to inhabit an imagined world in which they are making
judgements about the morality of historical actors and about the skill of their own peers”
(p. 25).
The importance of role playing with respect to learning in video games will be
addressed in greater detail in a later section.
Providing a context for learning is an important element of a constructivist
learning environment, but that context is much more powerful if it provides students with
opportunities for inquiry.