Technology's Impact


Kahoot

The tool that I chose was Kahoot. It falls under the "Games for learning" section of the ISTE article. Kahoot is considered a quiz game and offers a competitive nature to learning for the students. It is often used in classrooms to replace pencil and paper quizzes or for study purposes. Of the options that are available, most users play the game live and allow students to play against each other for points. The points in the game usually have no meaning but by playing the game, students usually get a pass fail grade on the assignment they are using Kahoot for. Kahoot can also be used as a fun game to pass the time after finals or in a program. There are other topics that the teens can choose from like movie trivia, music trivia, or just pop culture that would allow them to take a break from their usual use of the website. A teen or teacher can also make their own Kahoot quizzes and share them on the website. They can add video clips, audio clips, or images to the question to help others figure out the answer or that relate to the topic or question. They have the option to choose a quiz question with four or more answer choices or they can choose the true or false question.


Image credit: personal photo, Creator Samantha Hoffman


My Experiences
In my video, I explain how to use Kahoot from an educator and student point of view. From my experience, students love playing Kahoot in any form. They do not really see it as a game anymore and that is most likely because they are using it so much in the classroom that it is just another assignment to them. While I was student teaching, I tried to only use it as a study session tool and let the students know that they were getting participation points for it. That meant as long as I saw their name on the end board with some score, they would get their points. I always had one student who did not want to play but I knew he understood and knew the material so I told  him he did not need to play to win. As long as he got at least one point, he could play to lose. It worked and while it might not be the best way to get students to engage in the game, it made sure that everyone was attentive and playing in some way.


Resources

The first source that I found is from teachstarter.com and provides background information on why playing games in the classroom is beneficial for not only the students but the teachers as well. My second source is from the University of Toronto and discusses what game based learning is, what the best way to implement it in a classroom is, the pedagogy behind it, how to use it in a library and other resources that can be used to help further the use of gaming in the classroom. The third source I found is from Education World. It gives readers five reasons why gaming in the classroom helps the students as well as related topics and discussions that further explain the concept and also have a conversation for game based learning in all classrooms, even ones with adults in them. My fourth source is from Stanford University detailing a panel discussion that argued how games could provide opportunities for deeper and better learning for students. The last source is from a Montessori educator describing the benefits of allowing gaming in the classroom. 


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