Can we use serious games outside classroom?

Trace Effects is made by U.S. department of state and it was made to teach students English all around the world. The game is designed for player aged 12-16. It required "gamers interact and solve puzzles in a virtual world filled with diverse English-speaking characters." When you are playing the game, you need to " take a dynamic journey through the United States, traveling to cultural locations like Kansas, New Orleans, the Grand Canyon, New York City...".
I played Chapter One and Two twice to get familiar with the conversations or other knowledge about the game. I found that students will really benefit from the game if they get into playing it. They can learn knowledge about American cultural and make comparison to their own culture as well. The game also provides students with communication strategies that they can use in daily life and they can imitate native American accent when they play it. Moreover, the game is divided into different chapters and each week, students can play one chapter and focus on one at a time. What's more, the vocabulary in the game is quite easy for students to master.
If this game is used for outside classroom,  the language objectives might be SWABT:

• understanding specific American culture
• apply communication skills to daily life (how to ask for help)
• distinguish word meaning in specific context

After students playing the game, I would like to assess them from different aspects. I can employ some communication skills into class, for example, I can set up a theme, ask them to discuss how to ask for help. They can either prepare a presentation or role-play. Another way to assess them is to have them to write a review about this game. I think journal writing would assess how much do students understand the game and how much they learn from the game.
From what I learn from this game, I think some serious games can employ outside classroom and what they teacher needs to do are to get to know the game and set up specific language objectives for the game. More importantly, the game has to match students level.

Can we use strategy games outside classroom?

Big Fish Games is strategy game that students can play outside classroom. This is an online game which is designed for strategy learning. It has a casino in the game, you can choose to play Blackjack, Texas, or other games online. I think by playing this game, students would definitely learn how to make decisions. I played this game for 4 times. It is play-friendly game, because it is easy to start and easy to follow instruction. The challenge in the game would be how to make your strategy work and how to get more money from gambling. Students would find it interesting because it simulates the real-world situation--Casino! You can have your own chips in the game and also, you can choose your bet.There are also some vocabulary in the game, like "stand","hit", "double", which some of them contain different meaning from what students know before.

The language learning objectives for this game would be SWABT:
Distinguish different meanings of one word according to context;
Apply new words in real life learning;
Enhance the ability of strategy-making.
Through this game, I wish to complete the mission that it would help students to make strategy, I would focus on the simulate situation that they play. I think I would assess students by ask them how much money do they win in the game, ask them to make an oral report of how they win or loose money in the game, and also what do they get from the game. If they really are into the game, they might find some rules in play Blackjack, for example, when do you need to hit, when do you need to stand,  when can you double your bet, and when do you need to buy insurance in case of loosing too much money. In addition, I would make a word check-list that they need to finish which contains polysemy on the list. They need to find out the difference in context. And also, there would be a test on Blackjack, like if they get a 12, what will they do to win the bet. I think this activity would test their ability in decision making.

Even though I had fun in play Big Fish Games, I still doubt that if we really can employ this kind of games in teaching. What if students show no interest in the game or what if they are addicted to the game? There are still lots of questions need to be answer about using games for teaching.

Games In Classroom

Gamification is the infusion of game design techniques, game mechanics, and/or game style into anything.
The usage of games in language learning classroom is that it enhance the interaction between teachers and students. The engagement of teacher and students in the game might create a harmonious atmosphere in class. Both teachers and students need to be involved in the game. For example, if teachers use the game as a task, students need to follow instructions. Say, we use walkthroughs in the task, students have to focus on what they need to do next and how to finish the task. By so doing, teachers and students are very interactive to each other because one work as a guide and the other work as followers. What's more, students might encounter new vocabulary or other new language features in during the game, and teacher could work on these new things after they finish the game or during the game.

I personally played the game Phantasy Games for 4 times without the help of Walkthrough, but I failed to completed the mission. It was difficult for me to finish the game even under the help of walkthrough because some steps need to be very careful and if you failed to follow, you have to start from previous step or steps. If I employ games into my classroom, I think my language learning objectives might be SWABT:
Recognize vocabularies for directions ( go back, to the top, go to the right, etc.);
Understand directions by listening to walkthrough;
Apply direction vocabulary in daily life.
The role of teacher in the classroom would be a controller because teacher have to give directions and control what the students need to do. Also I think teacher might be a bridge that help students to finish the task. During the game, students would actively involve in the game by following orders or instructions given by the teacher. There is a goal in completing the task is that students need to rescue the girl, so they have to do it step by step. So, I would use a walkthrough for the game, because I want to incorporate my learning objectives in the game, and more importantly, I found it is really hard to finish the task alone. Students need directions and at the same time, teacher can assess whether the students understand the direction or not. I would also use images from the game to guild my students. For example, the arrow the show directions, or the items they are going pick up. I might make a powerpoint and show to my students.
After walkthrough, I would check if my students finish the task successfully or not, that would be one way to assess whether my learning objectives achieve or not. Another way to assess my learning objectives would be do a follow-up activity which require students to show directions, like ask for direction role-play, or picture telling about directions.

Use Twitter for Professional Development

Nowadays, twitter become one of the most popular social network that people use in daily life, but how can we use twitter to develop our profession also heated discussed by people. If you have been using twitter for quite a long time, you definitely notice that people tweet whatever that want. There are no rules for tweet something or retweet something. They do it because they want to not because they need to. If your followers are like this type, you were tired of reading spams and want to skip them and finally, you might loose interest in follow them.
10 Twitter Mistakes You Should Avoid tells you how to use twitter appropriately not only in professional development, but also in daily life. The first principle is that avoid over-tweeting

if someone over-tweeting, the whole homepage would be filled up by them, which bothers others a lot especially you tweet something useless and meaningless. Other mistakes are: follow Friday perversion, celebrity insulting, RIP for someone famous, retweet every compliment, tweet about food, etc. In China, we have Weibo, which is like Twitter in America. Some of my followers tweet about food everyday, even though I am tired of that, I would bother sometime because you have to say good words in your compliment. 

If you want to use Twitter for professional development, this article 10 WAYS Teachers Can Use Twitter for Professional Development provides you some ways. Create a strong profile page, use hashtags

and share what you read are mentioned in this article. After I read this article, I think I really did a bad job in using twitter for professional development. I don't have a strong profile, I did not filled up my bio as well. But I really think that Twitter can help educators a lot in future. If you use hashtags, you can find topics that interesting you in the whole twitter and join them to discuss the topic. Also, your questions might be answered by others around the world, which means you get opinions from around the world. Share what you read on twitter also help you develop your career. Say I read books or articles about how to teach refugees and I tweet my reviews, my followers read it and might also give comments on my tweet. What's more, someone who read the same article or book would provide their review on comments as well. By this way, you actually "communicate" with others about your thoughts. You can improve yourself and reflect what you do in class in twitter if you use it as a teaching diary.

Twitterchat

This actually is my first time to get involved in twitter chat , and it seems I was confused about this feature at first, however, when I search for hashtag, I find that there are so many people discuss some topic on it. Moreover, if you have questions about your field, you can put forward it on twitter and hashtag it, people with the same hashtag can help you out. 

Twitterchat embraces such great feature that we can share thoughts on this stage, and it's free! Social network makes the world smaller and shorten the distance between people by connect each other. For me, this would be great for professional development, because I can read others' tweets, learn from their experience and also post my questions waiting for someone to answer that for me. In this case, I might not just receive one answer, I might gather answers from different walks of people or from my field, that would be a wonderful thing for me! I like to hear from different people, and Twitterchat just provides this opportunity for me. I think it would help me a lot in future and I definitely would continue to use it!

Learn Clothing Vocabulary! (phrases 2)