Spore and Pedagogy Part 2: What is Spore and How Might It be Used in Education

Sunday,
March 22, 200 9 at 5:50PM

Like Simcity, the player begins the game with a blank slate. With Simcity, that
slate is a blank bit of ground which the city is built on. In Spore, the game
gives the player two options: Carnivore or Herbivore. Based on that choice the
player creates a single cell organism which the rest of the game is based on. The
player advances through five stages of evolution: Cell, Creature, Tribal,
Civilization and Space. Each stage builds on the next. I will focus on the first
two stages here because i believe they would be the most useful in education

In the beginning stages (The Cell Stage) of the game the player navigates his
or her cell through the primordial ooze. The goal at this stage of the game is to
eat and bread. By eating players gain “DNA Points.” Those points can be spent on
evolving the cell. The player also has the option of killing other cells and
stealing genetic components. Those genetic traits can be used to make improvements
to the cell. Once the player has collected enough points, the player can mate with
another cell and evolve.

Players can now use th genetic improvements they have collected to help them
cope better with the environment. This includes a better mouth (to eat a wider
verity of things) better fins (to swim faster), or defensive and offensive things
like claws, horns or electric-generating body sections. This is meant to mirror
normal evolutionary processes. Players build modify their cell to match a niche in
the ecosystem.

Once the player has collected enough overall DNA Points, the player can have
the cell move into the next stage of the game: The Creature Stage. The player is
given a set of tools to change the cell into a land based creature.

Like in the cell stage, the creature has to eat and mate. Added is an
interaction with other creatures in the world. They player must create alliance
with other creatures or species. The better those alliances the better the player
can defend against more advanced life forms or predators. Players are given a far
wider range of genetic improvements giving a far wider range of possible
creatures.

The thing that made Simcity such a useful teaching tool was it provided
students a platform for problem solving (i.e. how does one grow a city while
keeping citizens happy). In Spore the problem that needs be solved now to make the
most efficient, successful creature. How do you build the best creature that can
get food, defend itself and successfully interact with other creatures.

To do this in the classroom an instructor could give students as much leeway as
they want to push the tools. Each component of the creature can be shaped and
modified and tested before the player goes into the game. While building a
creature, an easy to read status menu changes on the right side of the screen so
the player can see exactly what the creature will be able to do.

But here is the problem, there is no way to really fail. No matter how crazy
you make your creature, it will always be able to eat and communicate. It may not
be able to do those things well, but it can still survive. Evolution is only
slowed down by not creating an efficient creature. If the game were a true
evolution simulator, making a creature that failed would cause the species would
die out.

This stage of the game could be such a useful tool for teaching students about
natural selection and adaptive traits. However, since there is no real way to
fail, it could be hard to see how evolution works. This seems to feed
into a wider discourse about intelligent design verse evolution, a subject I will
take up in the next post.

Mike
Lewis |
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Saturday
Feb072009

Integrated
21st Century Skills or Stealth Marketing

Saturday,
February 7, 2009 at 8:56PM

First of all, apologies for the hiatus. Funerals and illnesses sometimes derail
even the best of intentions to regularly blog. So, on to business.

I am in the middle of research with my regular English students, and every time
I hear the whiny cries of how there is absolutely NOTHING ANYWHERE about race and
television programming, I lose a year from my life. And after a particularly
frustrating 47 minutes of ceaseless wailing, I approached the
librarian/information specialist, and asked if it was this hard for every teacher.
After assuring me that it was, she added, .I have a problem with not teaching kids
the research skills they need..

Thus began a 15 minute (that.s long in the day of a teacher) conversation about
21st century skills and how we aren.t adequately preparing our students
for real-world scenarios. We wish we could do more, but in a catch-all public high
school, it.s tough.

I often dream of teaching in schools where there is a focus on particular
skills, because above all else, I want the concepts I teach to be relevant to my
students. Not unlike the philosophy of the proposed
Business of Sports School (or BOSS):

.The school plans to emphasize real-world skills
through mandatory internships at companies like ESPN The Magazine, ABC Sports and VitaminWater, as
well as by certifying kids in vital computer applications like Microsoft
Office..

I.m usually opposed to the idea of such obvious marketing to minors, but I have
to agree with Josh Solomon, the man heading the venture:

.I think sports will really engage the students,
but they’re really being prepared for the business world and the professional
world more broadly,” said Solomon. “The skills are very transferable..

Your thoughts Valuable education model to .hook. kids into learning, or
sinister marketing ploy

Julie
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Monday
Jan052009

Give ‘Em What They Want

Monday,
January 5, 2009 at 10:43PM

Junior English this week consists of preparing for the State Writing
Exam that happens at the end of the month. I get to review basic writing
strategies with my students, centered on this prompt (not the one they will write
for the actual exam):

.The Board of Education is seeking student input on possible electives to be
added to the curriculum. Think of an elective you would like added to the
curriculum, and write a persuasive essay explaining why your class would best
serve the student body..

Today.s basic writing strategy we reviewed was pre-writing. So many of my
students take one of two approaches when faced with a writing prompt: start
writing, even if it ends up a rambling mess, or write nothing because it.s gonna
be garbage anyway.

I tried to sell them on a happy medium, and in the process, we brainstormed a
list of possible electives they would like to see in their high school. Ideas
ranged from anatomy to pole dancing (no kidding). One student said, .We need a
class in pop culture!.

.We have one,. I replied. I know about it, because I designed it and wrote it
four years ago, and I hold eternal hope that one day I will be able to teach it
again. One of the sacrifices of going to grad school was giving up that class; it
is my only regret about going to grad school.

They wanted to know more about the class, so I explained the curriculum and
several students want to register for it next year. I don.t know why it wasn.t
advertised to them last year, but no matter. I.m back, and if I have my way, I
plan to recruit like crazy and pack the seats in that class.

I.m mulling over all kinds of thoughts about education reform lately, but this
brief discussion in class today reminded me that one step in the right direction
is to teach the skills students need using the media they regularly consume. In
doing so, they might actually retain those skills, because they were developed
using something that mattered to them.

Julie
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Thursday
Dec182008

This Post Brought To
You By…

Thursday,
December 18, 2008 at 9:17PM

The current economic climate has created fiscal fear in the hearts of
educators. Faced with budget cuts across the board, many educators whine and
complain about the lack of resources. But San Diego
teacher Tom Farber took matters into his own hands:

“Tough times call for tough actions,” he says. So he started selling ads on his
test papers: $10 for a quiz, $20 for a chapter test, $30 for a semester
final..

While I admire his moxie, inviting advertising to the classroom so brazenly is
a slippery slope. If Farber.s idea catches on, will sponsors want a say in what is
actually on the test Will parents who own businesses want final approval of the
quiz their student takes, ensuring a successful grade And even at a more basic
level, should high school students be introduced to such obvious marketing
strategies I am probably being reactionary, but even a cursory glance at the
relationship between corporate ownership and artist control in film and television
should serve as a warning.

I went to a conference in earlier this year. The welcome address was in a
state-of-the-art lecture hall called The Zone by Autozone, housed in the FedEx
Institute of Technology&at the University of Memphis. Students have plenty of time
to be subject to marketing in college. Let the high school kids alone.

Julie
L. Rowse | 2
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Friday
Nov212008

Film Club,
Dr. Strangelove

Friday,
November 21, 2008 at 10:27PM

Last week I took two members of my film club to Omaha.s non-profit cinema for a
screening of Stanley Kubrick.s Dr. Strangelove. My film club is
small.just a band of four or five students who gather in my room for 45 minutes
every Wednesday to watch films they wouldn.t normally see. I started the film club
as part of my volunteer position with the non-profit cinema. We are trying to find
a way to develop film clubs in high schools that reflect the mission of the
organization: .devoted to the presentation and discussion of film as an art
form..

To be honest, I was a little concerned how they would react to Kubrick.s film.
It is just so unlike films they choose to watch. I was nervous that I.d
have to elbow them to stop talking, texting, or sleeping. Then I was nervous that
during the discussion that followed the film, they wouldn.t listen, or complain
that they wanted to leave. How.s that for having faith in the American
teenager

As often happens, they proved all my fears to be irrational. They stayed awake.
They laughed when it was appropriate. They muttered valid commentary under their
breaths. They participated in the debrief. And on the way home, they raved. They
loved the experience of watching a film with a critical eye, of talking about what
Kubrick.s intentions were, of discussing the message the film was trying to send.
And they couldn.t wait to tell the other members of the club what they had
missed.

Sometimes I get so caught up in the discipline issues and apathy of a small
percentage of students that I forget about the students who crave being pushed to
do things they wouldn.t normally do. And just like I would push a capable student
to read The Scarlet Letter, I need to push my capable students beyond the
popcorn blockbuster movies to experience films that are more challenging. After
all, the students I teach are a visual generation, and it.s past time to start
teaching them how to read their world.

Julie
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Wednesday
Nov122008

The Value of a
Degree in Popular Culture

Wednesday,
November 12, 2008 at 6:21PM

When I decided to return to teaching high school
English instead of pursuing a PhD, I braced for the inevitable criticisms that
would come my way when I told people what I studied. For weeks, I tried to
crystallize, in one brief (and snarky) sentence, the value of my M.A. in Popular
Culture. But I couldn.t. I had learned too much, and the breadth of what I had
studied could not be captured in a retort.

Thankfully, the faculty at the high school I had
left two years prior was so glad I had returned, that the slings and arrows never
really came. The only time I.ve been hassled about it was from a new faculty
member.a friend.who encouraged a parent of one of my students to tell me that
.only basketball players get degrees in popular culture.. It was all in good fun,
truly, but that didn.t stop me from channeling Martin Luther and nailing my comps
list to my friend.s classroom door. Truth is, I wish I could shrink down my comps
list to a 3×5 card and hand it to people who, even in jest, question my
degree.

But today, I learned the value of my degree to my
high school students. We are slogging through Huck Finn, and I mean
slogging through it. They don.t understand Jim, they giggle every time
Huck uses the .n-word,. and the satire is completely lost on them. Just last
weekend I was almost ready to stop fighting them, pop in the movie, and call it
good. And then came the chapters on the Duke and the King.

The Duke and the King are con-men, and their second
con is to perform scenes from Richard the III, Romeo and Juliet, and Hamlet.s
famous .To be or not to be. soliloquy. Problem is, the Duke doesn.t know Hamlet.s
soliloquy at all. I point out the line from MacBeth, and the lines that appear out
of order in the real soliloquy, as well as lines from different acts in Hamlet,
and it hits me: I know why Twain included this in his novel! A nineteenth century
audience would have known Hamlet.s soliloquy, and the reason I know that, is
because I read.and retained.Lawrence Levine.s article on Shakespeare in the
nineteenth century.

And that was it. That was the breakthrough. I
explained to my students that while they may not get the humor, for Twain.s
audience, the Duke.s performance is hilarious. As I explained it to them, I
realized Levine.s article was just the tip of the iceberg. I can reference bell
hooks when I teach A Raisin in the Sun. I can teach them about historical memory
when we read The Great Gatsby. In fact, the American Literature canon is ripe with
opportunities to share the knowledge I gained from studying Popular Culture. And
that is the brief (but not snarky) sentence that sums up the value of my degree in
Popular Culture.

Julie
L. Rowse | 1
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Monday
Sep222008


Spore and Pedagogy Part 1: History and Sim City as a Teaching Tool

Monday,
September 22, 2008 at 12:01AM

For nearly twenty years Sim City and its successors
have been used as teaching tools.* Fan-run message boards and academic journals
have hosted numerous discussions about the SimCity series usefulness and
limitations in this field. When Spore, the
newest game by Sim City’s creator Will Wright was announced, I began to think
wonder what sort of role it might play in education.

Before I get into discussing Spore, let me begin by giving some back ground on
the subject. My interaction with the series began when a friend rented the Super
Nintendo version of Sim City. He was not impressed by the game, but I could not
stop playing it. I quickly got my own copy of the game and began spending hours
building cities, each more complicated than the next. In 1994, my attention turned
to the the next iteration of the series, Sim City 2000. Sim City 2000 ramped up
the games difficulty by added many new elements and increased the games
complexity. Unlike the NES version of the game, Sim City 2000 took me years to
master. An unofficial users guide published that year helped players decipher the
complex models governing the games world.

As much as I loved playing games like Super Mario Bros. and Final Fantasy, it
was Sim City that pushed me. In order to build effective cities I had to use
problem-solving skills and the ability to think about and understand systems far
beyond the level of most 12 year olds. As hard as the games were, I enjoyed
playing them and therefore had to learn these skills so that I could move the game
to the next level. I was not alone in this endeavor. A number of my friends also
played sim city and it was a constant topic of discussion. Our obsession went so
far as trying to form a Sim City club in 8th grade.

My first interaction with Sim City as a teaching tool came during my junior
year of high school. One of the units of the class was “urban design.” For two
days the class met in a computer lab and we played Sim City and Sim City 2000. I
do not know if I, or my fellow students, got anything out of those short poorly
guided sessions, but the teacher had the right idea. Give students a tool, a game,
and let them run free. Explore the world and its systems. Give them the space to
fail over and over again until they find something that works. So often there is
never room for anything like that in our education system. It does not jive with
the dominant orthodoxy of GPA, class rank and SAT scores. School has become more
about memorizing test taking methods to help on standardized exit exams and less
about learning real-world knowledge.

My interest in Spore, the newest video game by Will Wright, falls along the
same line. Spore is ultimately a game about evolution. The player begins as a
single cell organism living in the primordial ooze. Over the course of the game
the player makes numerous decisions about the creatures evolutionary path. As the
game progresses the player moves from a single cell to a space fairing race
exploring the reaches of the universe.

Over the next few weeks I will continue to blog about the role that video games
like Spore play in education. Of particular interest in this series of short
essays, is how the evolutionary discourse is perceived by religious, anti-science
commentators and backers of Intelligent Design.

*Some links to relevant articles to come in the next post.

Mike
Lewis |
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tagged education,
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city, spore,
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Friday
Sep192008

We are Looking
for Bloggers

Friday,
September 19, 2008 at 2:48PM

People interested in short term blogging assignments with the ECCCS should
submit the following:

- At least 3 blog entries/posts from a currently active or recently active
blog.

- A sample of what you d like to write for the ECCCS, not to exceed more than
1,000 words.

- Three keywords or phrases you think define your sample post.

Email me at the.ecccs@gmail.com

Mike
Lewis | Post a
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Tuesday
Sep162008

The Hallway!

Tuesday,
September 16, 2008 at 1:54PM
Links, videos, thoughts and rants; All will soon be available here at the The
ECCCS’s blog The Hallway.

The Hallway has a far more playful tone, but is no less serous. Our goal is to
provide a space for lively discussion about the world around us.

We will soon be asking people from around the net to contribute to this space. If
you have any questions hit me up on twitter or visit my other website.

Mike
Lewis | Post a
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