At a delicious chili cook-off this past Saturday, I engaged in a conversation with one of my dear colleagues’ two children, grades 6 and 8.
“Do you play Minecraft?” I ask the 6th grade daughter.
“Yeah. It’s so fun,” she sweetly replies.
“So, it’s like… a game that let’s you build things?” I probe, trying to truly understand this game that so many of our students engage in.
“Yeah. You can also play with other people – and build things together.”
I was intrigued. Once we moved the hang out venue from the chili cook-off to my house, I grabbed my iPad, downloaded the Lite version, and asked my friend’s daughter to show me how this game works.
Once she started to play, I was blown away. No, (not mind blown like I was at the EARCOS iPad conference) not because it was so amazing that I couldn’t wait to play it, but because it was a series of pixelated cubes that she kept calling “wool” of various colors.
“What’s this?” I ask.
“Oh, that’s sheep. In Creative mode, they’re just there, but in Survival mode, you can use their fur for warmth and stuff.”
What?
Losing interest to the Goats that sound like humans Youtube clip, she left me to my own device (ha! Pun so intended). Losing interest in the lone game of pool, her 8th-grade brother came out of my game room and took over my iPad. Thank goodness – I could barely turn left in the game.
“Here, let me show you something really cool.” Oh, great, I thought to myself. How cool can these pixelated weird objects can be? But like rubber-necking an accident, I couldn’t help but stare at the swiftness of his fingers, the calculated laying of colored wool blocks, the strategic crumbling and rebuilding of… stuff… and when he finished, he said, “Look!”
“What the…” was my response.
He had built a massive building designed in the shape of a sheep, multi-leveled and… well, impressive. He had done it in 7 minutes while warding of zombies at night that tried to kill him, even pausing to laugh at the Trust Fall video clip from Youtube that I just had to share with the company. How’d he do that?
“Wait, how did you know to put the blocks at these strategic places? How did you know how to create this hollow space, or spaces, to make the shape of the eyes and mouth in a building?”
“Uh… like… you can see it,” he shrugs as he answers.
“And why did you decide to put the fire torches here?” I ask in fascination.
“Oh, that’s to keep the zombies from spawning.” Again, a matter-of-fact reply.
What…?
Marc Prensky in “Shaping Tech for the Classroom” is right: “If we want to move the useful adoption of technology forward, it is crucial for educators to learn to listen, to observe, to ask, and to try all the new methods their students have already figured out, and do so regularly.”
Hearing these two kids, and hearing my high school kids (as I’ve found myself doing more intentionally ever since starting COETAIL), talk to me about technology has been not only intriguing but meaningful. To them, to me – there’s a lot out there to talk about. Who knew that pixelated, amateur-is-this-the-80s looking images could be put into building amazing things that you’d (okay, maybe just me?) never have imagined possible? Who knew that spatial reasoning, proportion, survival (albeit basic in my example) could be brought up so matter-of-factly in a conversation with an 11 and a 13-year-old?
I agree that our kids are digital citizens so it is important for us to put in “a big effort [that our kids] deserve no less” of (Prensky). I’m fortunate to be a in a school community that does value this notion and plan to take full advantage.
What kinds of tech-related conversations are you having with your students?
(I must add: By “our kids”, I do mean those who are of-the-like in international schools, the mid-to-high SES level family homes, parents with college degrees, etc., because I greatly wonder about what this shift is doing for our low SES students who do not have access to such means.)
I enjoyed your post. I feel like I’m listening with more intention in my classroom since starting COETAIL, as well. I’m asking them more questions about their tech usage for school and fun, and getting so much more out the classroom… the COETAIL effect! I showed the “What Most Schools Don’t Teach” which focuses on coding. We had some great conversations after that… “What is coding used for?” “Why do they have all those games and play things in the Google & Facebook offices – will people work?” They left the room buzzing.
Dear Elizabeth,
Thank you for sharing what you learned. It seems that it has bee easy for teachers to talk to students and talk to each other about new technologies. As you point out, we are probably not listening enough. What do students hope to learn, or learn to be able to do, in one-to-one settings? I think that also goes to a second point in your post. As teaches and adults we need to find opportunities to listen. The children you talked to felt safe enough to share their thoughts and enthusiasm for the game with you. How do you think that we can remind ourselves to be good listeners? How can we create an atmosphere where students will feel that they can tell us what they are thinking about digital learning? Has this influenced how you interact with your own students?
Sincerely,
Garry
Hi Elizabeth! You came up first in my RSS feed tonight and I’m glad I clicked onwards. You talk about the value of having conversations with our kids about technology. I agree its important but sometimes I’m surprised at my school by how little many kids do in regards to interacting with technology. For instance, I was grading tonight and was shocked to see that two students noted how it was a challenge to communicate out of school to work on project. Really? They both have laptops and Internet access. I didn’t know what to say. Sometimes asking kids about technology can help us find new things but is equally important in finding out what they use and what they don’t. We often make assumptions about them as digital natives.
Secondly, I’m glad you noted a concession to different SES. While teaching in the international school setting is great, I can’t help but think of public schooling in Canada which i left not too long ago and the various SES groups within it. Of course, that is only magnified when considering the global diversity (disparity?) at play.
Thanks for the post.
LOL….last blog post of the day for me and you have me reading it out loud to my wife. Mindcraft still floors me as well. I think my ’80s games had better graphics than Mindcraft does and yet they flock to it….because it’s not about the graphics it’s about the connection, the building, the problem solving, and that is where the community is right now.
We learn so much from just observing and listening to how they use technology…from there we find ways to use it productivity with them to meet our own learning outcomes. Thank you for ending my reading day with a smile!
Dear Liz,
What a great post friend! It’s even more vivid for me since I was sitting next to you when this happened! I love the way you tell stories
Not only is your writing so good, but also so true. It’s so important for us as educators to listen with an open mind, to know that we’re not always going to know what the kids are talking about (..to keep the zombies from spawning…?!?), but we can listen between the lines (I’m problem solving.) It can be intimidating, sure, I mean, aren’t us teachers the ones ‘who know everything’?
I admire your willingness to have these conversations with your kids, even though it might seem sometimes that they’re speaking a completely different language… because they are. They don’t call them ‘natives’ for nothing, this is in fact their native language and we’re just trying to learn it as quickly as possible. Nowadays I find myself looking up terms in Urban Dictionary more so than common Dictionaries so I can keep up… true story.
*clap clap* Ms. Cho-Young! On your post and the meaningful reflections!
So I furthered my discussion about gaming and my students’ social online interactions in general. And then I realized that I thought it was “MinDcraft” this whole time while it was “MinEcraft”! Bah hahahaha – I laughed at myself with my kids for a while at this one. I fixed it now, what I wrote as “Mindcraft” to “Minecraft”. I felt old today. Fail.
Thanks all for your comments.