No abstract

COMPUTERS ARE changing our world: how we work, how we shop, how we entertain ourselves, how we communicate, how we engage in politics, how we care for our health. The list goes on and on. But will computers change the way we learn? The short answer is yes. Computers are already changing the way we learn -and if you want to understand how, just look at video games. Not because the games that are currently available are going to replace schools as we know them any time soon, but because they give a glimpse into how we might create new and more powerful ways to learn in schools, communities, and workplaces -new ways to learn for a new Information Age. Look at video games because, while they are wildly popular with adolescents and young adults, they are more than just toys. Look at video games because they create new social and cultural worlds -worlds that help us learn by integrating thinking, social interaction, and technology, all in service of doing things we care about.We want to be clear from the start that video games are no panacea. Like books and movies, they can be used in

Interactive immersive entertainment, or videogame playing, has emerged as a major entertainment and educational medium. As research and development initiatives proliferate, educational researchers might benefit by developing more grounded theories about

The form factors of handheld computers make them increasingly popular among K-12 educators. Although some compelling examples of educational software for handhelds exist, we believe that the potential of this platform are just being discovered. This paper reviews innovative applications for mobile computing for both education and entertainment purposes, and then proposes a framework for approaching handheld applications we call ''augmented reality educational gaming.'' We then describe our development process in creating a development platform for augmented reality games that draws from rapid prototyping, learner-centered software, and contemporary game design methodologies. We provide a narrative case study of our development activities spread across five case studies with classrooms, and provide a design narrative explaining this development process and articulate an approach to designing educational software on emerging technology platforms. Pedagogical, design, and technical conclusions and implications are discussed.

While the knowledge economy has reshaped the world, schools lag behind in producing appropriate learning for this social change. Science education needs to prepare students for a future world in which multiple representations are the norm and adults are required to ''think like scientists.'' Location-based augmented reality games offer an opportunity to create a ''post-progressive'' pedagogy in which students are not only immersed in authentic scientific inquiry, but also required to perform in adult scientific discourses. This cross-case comparison as a component of a design-based research study investigates three cases (roughly 28 students total) where an Augmented Reality curriculum, Mad City Mystery, was used to support learning in environmental science. We investigate whether augmented reality games on handhelds can be used to engage students in scientific thinking (particularly argumentation), how game structures affect students' thinking, the impact of role playing on learning, and the role of the physical environment in shaping learning. We argue that such games hold potential for engaging students in meaningful scientific argumentation. Through game play, players are required to develop narrative accounts of scientific phenomena, a process that requires them to develop and argue scientific explanations. We argue that specific game features scaffold this thinking process, creating supports for student thinking non-existent in most inquiry-based learning environments.