In defense of the "PlayStation generation"

by Kyle Orland { Mar 4th 2007 at 3:30PM }

Jack Thompson isn't the only one worried about the deleterious effects of video games on our youth. U.S. Department of Homeland Security executive Jay Cohen recently told PC World magazine about an "[education] crisis in this country" caused by a "PlayStation generation" that wants quick thrills and avoids difficult subjects like math and science.

We understand that Cohen might just be using the "PlayStation generation" moniker as a convenient, rhyming shorthand for a new group of students who've grown up with the near-ubiquitous system. And we understand that there is a real problem with math and science education in this country, especially when compared with the rest of the world. But to imply that students raised on modern video games are easily distracted and afraid of a challenge is simply nonsense.

Ask any gamer who's gotten a 100 percent completion in Grand Theft Auto III if they were inclined to give up because it was "too hard." Ask the new breed of professional gamers if they are reluctant to practice for hours a day because the competition is "too hard." Ask the thousands of fans who've decided to develop mods for their favorite game if they were discouraged from learning the necessary programming skills because it was "too hard."

Students aren't shying away from math and science because the subjects are hard -- they're shying away because no one has made these subjects interesting to them. Instead of vilifying video games for encouraging instant gratification, our educators should be trying to learn what makes these games so engaging and applying these same techniques to their math and science courses. It's amazing what students are willing to learn if the lessons are hidden in the guise of something fun.

[Update: Fixed a grammar error. Thanks malwin.]

Tags: education, math, playstation generation, PlaystationGeneration, science, vidiot, villify

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

Easy_G @ Mar 4th 2007 3:40PM

Maybe I'm not like most gamers, but I know that videogames are what helped me get into math and science. Thinking about all the code, math, and physics going on behind the scenes of a game makes it impossible not to be intrigued. Plus the puzzle solving aspects can directly relate to math. Much more so at least than they would relate to literature or some other liberal arts area of study.

jadenguy @ Mar 4th 2007 3:41PM

i personally think videogames jumped the shark when they worked in the z axis with any sort of consistancy, in terms of difficulty. 3d games are pretty hard to make difficult without being considered unfair due to lots of issues, primarily camera i'd say. most games nowadays are pretty easy. too easy. that's what's weakening the country. in my day, you used to play a game where you had to walk 10 miles barefoot. in the snow. and when you got to the end of the level, you fought a boss that didn't have weakpoints, and you LOVED IT. then when you beat that, you had to play the game all over again on hard mode. which was impossible.

Brandon @ Mar 4th 2007 3:41PM

Public officials are always looking for a convenient scapegoat for society's problems. Instead of addressing the difficult task of improving schools, its easier to blame it on things like tv and videogames. It happens all the time, and unfortunately it means nothing gets done that deals with the core problem.

Negativecool @ Mar 4th 2007 3:42PM

Ugh....does this guy know that gaming is WAY bigger in Japan---where the Playstation even COMES from??..Now sir, where do the Japanese rank in Math and Science vs. the US...Thought so. The problem lies not with the students but in our crap educational system. File this one under "another moron with little else to go by so he blames an easily misunderstood scapegoat."

Arno @ Mar 4th 2007 3:44PM

I'm sorry, but what is Computer Science? It's science with a lot of math.

Xian! @ Mar 4th 2007 3:46PM

Dude, I'm not readin all that! Shrtr artcls plz.

Chris @ Mar 4th 2007 3:53PM

"Students aren't shying away from math and science because the subjects are hard -- they're shying away because no one has made these subjects interesting to them."
I don't know if this was the point the anti-ps generation author was trying to make, but I think the above quote pretty much proves his argument. Of course people are interested in math and science etc. Given the choice between fun and work, anyone would take work. The problem is that gamers, myself included, just don't care about working on things that don't entertain them. Not everything in life is entertaining. Sometimes we have to work so we can enjoy entertainment.
I know plenty of "gamers" who are very good students. It's about how these kids are being raised. I'll bet most of the parents just need to take away the freakin' 360 when their child has homework to do.

LaughingTarget @ Mar 4th 2007 3:55PM

I believe this is more of a shift in priorities. If we see who the truly powerful and successful are, they aren't the ones who create new technologies, but those who exploit them. What good is a strong innovative mind when you can just buy them and make money off their efforts? The USA leads the world in making the most effective accountants, financiers and business executives. These are the professions that run the business world and, in turn, control politics. Apple has better R&D people, but they're piss-poor compared to Microsoft in running an actual business. If you can't leverage your technologies, someone who can will just take it out from under you.

I don't see where the problem is. Since the USA is already the major world economy, technologies will come easy as companies can simply buy top talent from these mathematically more capable regions.

Furthermore, we have to ask what KIND of math and science these children are excelling at. There are two kinds: adaptive and innovative. A major problem outside of the western worlds is the lack of innovative thought. They're geared toward taking existing technologies and refining them, not developing new technologies. Innovative technology, by its nature, is far more difficult than taking an existing technology and improving on it. The top nations on these lists aren't exactly well known for creating volumes of Earth-shattering technologies (they do make new stuff, just not as much as "lesser" nations). The United States still sits in the driver's seat in new patents, despite this math and science "crisis" having been going on since the 80s.

American schools are notably less focused on hard, tangible subjects as they are on more abstract subjects. While this format does create a disadvantage on comparative tests, it fosters an ability to invent, not simply make more efficient.

Diskoboy @ Mar 4th 2007 3:55PM

I never found science hard. Math was my weak subject in high school.

And I agree - find a way to get kids interested in learning about those subjects. I dreaded math classes throughout my educational tenure. The classes were more boring than a beached whale. The only time I ever did good in math was my junior year - my algebra teacher made it fun. She didn't just sit there, at the chalkboard, and drone on...

Sadistic Freek @ Mar 4th 2007 3:58PM

@#1
"Thinking about all the code, math, and physics going on behind the scenes of a game makes it impossible not to be intrigued. Plus the puzzle solving aspects can directly relate to math. Much more so at least than they would relate to literature or some other liberal arts area of study."

That's exactly the way I feel. I mean, games are probably the only reason I'm going to college (I would like to get into the industry), and enjoying programming as much as I am. But this guy's words should be taken as an effing joke. They want to blame the games, but the government officials are the ones deciding that education as a whole should take a backseat to violence and war... at least games give the people a little time away from this crap-tastic time we're living in. I can't even watch the news anymore without getting pissed off.

ManekiNeko @ Mar 4th 2007 4:07PM

I tuned out the Department of Fearmongering a long, long time ago. Everything they say boils down to "EVERYBODY PANIC!!! Also, vote Republican or the terrorists win."

JR

driven2sin @ Mar 4th 2007 4:12PM

there's $$$$ in porn & games

Poisoned Al @ Mar 4th 2007 4:14PM

You know they said the same thing about television, until they found out they could use it to turn the nation into a load of unthinking retards that would vote for them.

DiRT @ Mar 4th 2007 4:17PM

So the accolades of the top .0001% of gamers make up for the millions (perhaps billions) who turn away from actual knowledge because the pursuit of which is "not fun"?

Andrew Yoon @ Mar 4th 2007 4:17PM

As a teacher, I can say that it's taken quite a long time for teaching to accept alternate forms of media as acceptable "literature." Even now, many non-progressive teachers shy away from anything other than canonical literature. Other media-savvy teachers understand what students want, and how to incorporate media into interesting, engaging (and most importantly) informative lessons. Movies and music are commonly used in many schools: it's only a matter of time until games can be used in education as well.

Thain @ Mar 4th 2007 4:22PM

Speaking as an educator (granted, a literature/writing teacher, not a math/science teacher), a huge part of the problem is the fact that the IMPORTANCE of learning is no longer being stressed to kids. Even five years ago, when my wife graduated high school, there were kids who had been held back in high school (this being the deep south, there was one student in her graduating class who was over 20).

Now, in order to look better for state standards committees, school systems are doing everything in their power to make sure that kids who SHOULD be held back a year instead move on to the next grade, whether that means giving the students tens (or even hundreds) of "free" grades (in the school at which I am currently teaching, a test grade barely carries any more weight than a homework grade), enrolling students in Summer school to ensure they pass the course before the next grade comes up, or just writing the student off as "passing," even though he or she had a failing grade, and simply moving them into a tech-prep class for the next year (my school has a 2 level, a 1 level, and an honors level for each core curriculum grade level).

Schools have tutoring days where students can come in for help. Generally, the only students who come in are the ones who have to make up tests and quizzes or the students whose parents actually care enough to force them into tutoring.

You want to know why a society like Japan has better math and science (well, really EVERYTHING) scores than the US? It's because education is still emphasized as important there. Sure they play games - you would need something interactive to help blow off steam, too, if you worked/studied the same hours they do. They also realize, whether because the parents drill it into the students' heads or simply because there is a higher national consciousness, that you HAVE to have a good education if you want to avoid flipping burgers for the rest of your life. In a society where the 5-day workweek was considered completely alien until recently, the importance of having a good job receives more acknowledgment, but there are problem kids in Japanese schools, just like in American schools.

There are any number of factors to blame in declining test grades ACROSS the curriculum standards (not just math and science by any means), but, while an overzealous pursuit of leisure might play some small role, I would hardly call video games a leading cause of any kind of academic degradation. As always, though, they make a damn good scapegoat.

tmmoore_nc @ Mar 4th 2007 4:26PM

I've never heard the term "Playstation generation" before, but the term seems correct. The context is all wrong of course.

I agree with the first commentor in that schools have failed, at least in this country to make math and science interesting. Mostly, it's just boring and filled with propaganda. But then again, it seems almost all education today is like that.

I don't know about you guys, but video games actually help me concentrate. Before class everyday, I play 30 minutes on my DS lite (No, I don't have any of the brain games), and it really helps me think and communicate in class.

Video games = violence? I don't think so. I mean, if a kid gets in trouble today, they'll just blame video games if they're smart. But most gamers I know have never committed a crime.

Someone needs to sit this guy down in front of Super Mario Bros. and ask him if he feels the need to kill turtles afterwards?

He says 'yes', he's obviously lying.
He says 'no', then he's got no beef towards video games. EVER.

Kill Jebus @ Mar 4th 2007 4:33PM

Great comments people....kudos go out to Joystiq...it is yet another SAD day to be an American with this "government of idiocy, and hypocrisy. How about the 1000's of kid's minds who are polluted and closed up never to again think on their own or question anything that does not make sense in the Bible Camps becoming soldiers to fight in "Gods" war.
So, so, so, sad.
Maybe someday this country will wake up and let the Godfearing, hate/war mongering South Succeed so that the United States can come back to reality with the rest of the Western World.
Damn you Abe...why could you not just let go?

Retrofied @ Mar 4th 2007 4:35PM

Achievement system in school, NOW!!

Steve @ Mar 4th 2007 4:46PM

you meant secede, right?

AssemblyLineHuman @ Mar 4th 2007 4:51PM

Our [The USA's] school system needs to be torn down and rebuilt from the ground up. The problem isn't that standards aren't high enough. The problem is that, in a country where individuality and freedom are so strongly stressed, we rely on a dumbed down model of the worldwide system that beats something into someone until they get it. In the end, the knowledge, the training, and the obedience to authority are all instilled, but the will to continue to learn and to grow mentally are completely destroyed.

fawazr @ Mar 4th 2007 4:55PM

I don't think a hard video game can be properly compared to a hard subject. And it's no one's job to make math and science fun and exciting. If kids want to take more pride in their Gamerscore than they do in their GPA, then so be it. America's academic dominance was taken for granted for so long; it's only logical that it should come to an eventual end. And don't forget that nearly 30 percent of this country's population believe that the Sun revolves around the planet Earth.

Speaking personally (and realistically), I'd have a much different (and prosperous) life if all my time playing video games were spent studying.

MrSpeakeasy @ Mar 4th 2007 4:56PM

Hey does anyone remember Number Munchers? That game rocked!

Neebs @ Mar 4th 2007 4:57PM

My math teacher does her best to integrate something interesting into a lot of lessons. We made fun stuff out of solving quadratic equations.
gg

sheppy @ Mar 4th 2007 5:07PM

Thain, I hate to say it but I wouldn't exactly call Japan's education system the preferred method. After all, their education system is at the core of why Japan happens to be the suicide capital of the world among youths. America leads in gun deaths, Japan leads in students offing themselves instead of others. I mean, hell, it's so prevelant in that culture, Suicide clubs form on the internet. Random people wanting to kill themselves ut not wanting to die alone. You don't see that shit in America or if you do, it remains excessively rare.

The problem with Japan's system is the atronomincally high amount of stress put on children even as early as 8 years old. Their grades and their tests determine their next step and likewise, even those steps determine their high school. Not getting into the right school them becomes a social embarassment to you and your family. In America, we treat an honor system as a reward. In Japan, not getting into an honor system is treated like bringing shame to your household. Nay, good sir. Japan's system is not the answer.

Instead, let me put it this way. I read something in a Michael Moore book (I know, I know) that struck me as quite interesting and from what I notice, it's true. He vistied a foreign country once and was asked by children some rather deep questions. He found this remarkable but that's not his issue that I find interesting. He then draws parallels to in America, the various discussions he overhears in sports bars. People keeping track of stats relating to close to 20 years of football. I'm sure many old school gamers remember the codes they threw in games as a child (hell, when playing Megaman Anniversary, despite having not touched MM2 in well over 10 years, I was able to remember and put in the Wily's Castle code in the password system).

The question, I feel, is not in regards to whether or not we can do these things compared to other countries but rather where our focuses lie. Hell, I can debate 1950's movies with friends and all of us were born after the 70s. While we don't have problems with grades (long ago, graduated), imagine what we could achieve if that same amount of interest was funneled into something like physics. People are capable of intelligent thought and discourse. It's just where their interest lies that focuses their attentions.

John Britt @ Mar 4th 2007 5:08PM

It's not that its too hard to play games, its that kids dedicate their time to gaming to the point of having no social life.

I think gamers can find common ground with other gamers and their own age demographic, but when they try to relate to adults or even people who don't let games dictate their lifestyle.

I'm scared of the fact that kids will not have true realistic stories to tell to the future, they have to talk about the glory days of playing games with graphics that were passable.

I'm not of the mindset that games only cause violence, I wish more kids and young adults will learn to tackle more adult situations with something they need more, life experience.

Games are an escape from reality, but kids will need to learn to cope and judge reality on terms other than games.

Jack the Ripper @ Mar 4th 2007 5:10PM

I'm sorry, but I'm not reading anything about this guy saying, "IMPORTANT ACTION ALERT: Children have to stop playing video games NOW!" Cheeses Pies, of course video games have a detrimental effect on kids who play too much. It is a parenting issue, as is the need for parents to keep children in line with their schooling in other ways. You can't possibly expect the federal government to do a good job of raising our nation's kids and be a reasonable human being at the same time.

CJC @ Mar 4th 2007 5:10PM

There are FAR too many problems with the education system to tackle at once, and I don't think video games are one of them.

I stopped caring about the system after dodgeball (and other games) were banned from schools to preserve the losing kids' self-esteem.

Give me a call once education and discipline take priority over feeling good and Ritalin.

Yuccadude @ Mar 4th 2007 5:23PM

Yeah, dodgeball ruled, and it didn't matter if you won or lost really, just that you had a chance to hurt someone. For a really good dodgeball game, super dodgeball for NES was the best game ever.

SuicideNinja @ Mar 4th 2007 5:28PM

"Students aren't shying away from math and science because the subjects are hard -- they're shying away because no one has made these subjects interesting to them."

Well said. Math and Science are fun subjects, but they are usually presented horribly, or their stereotype for being "nerdy" or difficult supersedes reality. History is usually presented poorly as well (I still hate it).

Look at Brain Age...it uses simple math and problem solving, but it's fun. Talk about a scapegoating the wrong activity.

WhatIsThatThing @ Mar 4th 2007 5:40PM

This guy is completely off-base about us gaming minority. I don't know about other people, but I've always been interested in math and science. It's all about priorities. I play video games most of the day, but when I have to do a project or homework or something, I'll only procrastinate about a half-hour before I actually go out and do it. There needs to be some sort of initiative. For me it's college. By the way, I'm a high school student.

WhatIsThatThing @ Mar 4th 2007 5:40PM

Also, I've had about 2 C+s in my life. Nothing lower.

quickshade @ Mar 4th 2007 5:48PM

"Students aren't shying away from math and science because the subjects are hard -- they're shying away because no one has made these subjects interesting to them. Instead of vilifying video games for encouraging instant gratification, our educators should be trying to learn what makes these games so engaging and applying these same techniques to their math and science courses. It's amazing what students are willing to learn if the lessons are hidden in the guise of something fun."

I agree 100% with this statement. But they will never do it. We don't have the educators for it, Plus federal and state governments suck. Not to mention poor funding. Shame on him for blaming gaming for the problem. When it might be the solution

Psaakyrn @ Mar 4th 2007 5:55PM

And the post itself shows what's wrong with Education in it's current state. Instead of trying to disguise Maths/Science as somethign fun, why not just make it fun to begin with?

AssemblyLineHuman @ Mar 4th 2007 6:18PM

After a lot of digging, I found this article from last year on why video games seem to give us an artificial high.
http://lostgarden.com/2006/07/games-are-designer-food-for-infovores.html
The article discusses games as means of conveying information (including information irrelevant to the "real world") and a finding by researchers that "that the neural pathways through which we learn about the world tap into the same pleasure networks in the brain as are activated by drugs like heroin."

But that's not the reason I remembered the article. In the comments following the article, readers were discussing possible reasons why, if humans are so geared to learn, students get so incredibly bored by school. I thought of the article because of one comment in particular by a reader going by Bartoneous because he articulated the same views that I hold on the matter very well:

"Though it may be a 'wicked problem', part of the issue is also that school is not just simply a place you go to learn. It isn't just an information dump that you can choose from at your leasure [sic] and gain pleasure from the information you're gathering.

School is a heavily elitist place where students are not only expected to learn, but they are given a standard on which their learning is scaled in order to progress to level of more advanced learning. As early as kindergarten the 'smart' kids are specially selected for further education. It's similar to the concept that celebrities get all kinds of free things, we're spending more time educating the more intelligent children. We're teaching the smart ones more, and almost blatantly telling the less intelligent students that they -are- less intelligent and therefore they will be educated less.

If school were a place where you could -choose- to learn or not, and you could choose what you learned, then maybe the pleasurable aspect of it would come out more. College is a lot more like this, but by that point many students are so burned out by the education system that they view it as yet another hurdle to overcome before they can finally stop learning."

Dave @ Mar 4th 2007 6:39PM

I wasn't very good at dodgeball. Well, actually I was amazingly good at dodging--I was almost always one of the last guys on the team; but I sucked at throwing. I threw like a girl--and it's that humiliation that made me the sarcastic asshole I am today. Thank you, dodgeball!

unholy @ Mar 4th 2007 6:50PM

Ask any gamer who's gotten a 100 percent completion in Grand Theft Auto III how their spelling and grammar is.

whose: the possessive case of "who" used as an adjective
who's: a contraction of "who has"

noteworthy @ Mar 4th 2007 7:26PM

After having read the comments to this article. I think I'm going to give up games for a while...

cafeman @ Mar 4th 2007 8:38PM

Kyle Orland wrote:

'Ask any gamer who's gotten a 100 percent completion in Grand Theft Auto III if they were inclined to give up because it was "too hard."'

You're comparing strongly task-oriented gameplay with short-term highly achievable goals built on the same principles as a Skinner box against an activity that requires strong abstract and conceptual skills, both of which require a significant amount of development, and neither of which offers strong short-term pay-offs.

I don't agree with the article in that games are the cause of the lack of attention in kids, but saying that beating 100% of GTAIII is analogous to learning complex higher math or science is facile at best. I know you're supposedly "only" blogging (and pulling in an income from it, natch), but there's a reason *why* games and gamers cop so much flack. It's because of comparisons like the one presented by Kyle. People other than gamers don't take schlock like this seriously because it's not even close to rational - it's middle-school level logic. Gamers like to laugh at Jack Thompson, but what I think most don't realise is that when comparisons like this are made, it simply provides ammunition to the rest of the media to have a laugh at "gamers" as a whole. Somewhat unfairly, I might add, given that it's just one mouthpiece that's making such a statement.

There are plenty of rebuttals against what Cohen is suggesting (including a misguided educational system, a strong disconnect between learning and personal development / success, and so on), but saying that gamers aren't afraid of working hard because they'll do lots of short-term tasks with immediate pay-offs isn't one of them.

Jake @ Mar 4th 2007 8:45PM

If a child isn't getting good grades, what the hell are they doing playing video games? Don't be the cool dad. Be the mean asshole dad (in the child's mind, not like an actual asshole by adult standards)

fishamaphone @ Mar 4th 2007 10:17PM

I wish Joystiq would get off their fucking highorse.

For every gamer who creates a mod for their favorite game, there's five who don't know what a "mod" is. For every gamer that's completed GTA3 at 100%, there are 10 who have never completed any game -- ever.

Just because you can provide some exceptions does NOT mean that there is no rule. More specifically, the claim isn't even a rule, just a "trend." Yes, there are more things than video games that are affecting how kids learn, but don't discount the effects of video games based solely on a minority of gamers.

lmao6 @ Mar 4th 2007 10:30PM

I havea PSP PS2 had a PS1 and want a PS3, my best subjects in school? Physics Calculus and Discrete Mathematics, why do pple blame video games for everything???

Steve @ Mar 4th 2007 10:34PM

Hum.... Our government schools are filled with teachers who are part of a union and constantly use the monopolistic power of that union to do what all unions do: make the job easier for their members by raising costs and lower quality. (I laugh every time some teacher tells me how they sometimes have to work after hours and on weekends. Yes, they actually believe teachers are the only people who have to work beyond 35 hours a week.)

Next, we have a political party, the democrats, that thrive when the nation's voters are ignorant. Ignorant voters will buy into socialist economic policies as if the entire 20th century never happened and wet their diapers on global warming hysteria. And no one seems to have a clue that their "wonderful" Orwellian federal legislative solutions are completely unconstitutional.

So basically we've gone into this unholy alliance between the democrats and the Teachers' Union. The teachers produce an endless stream of ignorant voters and the democrat party rewards the teachers by constantly lowering standards and boat loads of money at the schools.

But, silly me, I guess the demise of our educational system is actually the result of the Playstation!

on the basics of the US Constitution, economics, math, science, etc. To an uninformed voter socialism sounds great, the "science" behind man-made global warming sounds scary

S_DOG34 @ Mar 4th 2007 11:04PM

@assemblylinehuman

I am student teaching right now and I have some thoughts. Are you joking? Is it your contention that students in this country through high school should be able to choose what they learn and whether they should or should not learn at all? Have you even seen a student under the age of 18 any time recently? We are talking about people who have not yet fully developed in a cognitive/biological sense and hence are not able to make long-term rational solutions, especially about education. I'm a pretty liberal individual, but the idea of some hippie do-whatever-you-want primary education system is a total joke and would be a complete and utter disaster. Besides, high schools have electives these days (most middle schools and junior highs do as well) along with the core required classes.

And the comparison of educational tracking and celebrity status is a disgrace. What you do not seem to realize is that before students were placed in appropriate classes based on their abilities, students with learning disabilities, special-needs students, etc. were simply left behind. It was a Darwinian model of education. In that model, NO students were being adequately educated because there was such a range of abilities in a given classroom that it was impossible to cater instruction to all students. Are you suggesting that lower achieving students would benefit from being in the same classroom and presented with the same material as high achieving students? How in the world will that help those students perceive of learning as something interesting or even attainable?

I don't think you or the poster you're piggy backing upon even knows what some of the terms you throw around mean. To insinuate that less intelligent students are being educated less (because they are using less difficult materials) is a fallacy. The level of educating a student receives has nothing to do with the difficulty of the material with which they are presented. You should also go look up what "learning" means. It doesn't stop when you leave school and it's not a hurdle to overcome. It is not something that you can choose to do or not do. You are perpetuating the false notion that so many young people in this country have about learning and what it is.

The fact that somebody else wrote this and you find it so appealing that you pasted it here makes this all the more shocking and heartbreaking. At the very least, compose your own thoughts on the matter (however unrealistic and misguided they may be).

samfish @ Mar 4th 2007 11:58PM

First of all, #43: There's so much stupid in what you wrote that it flies in the face of rational, intelligent thought.

Next,
"Students aren't shying away from math and science because the subjects are hard -- they're shying away because no one has made these subjects interesting to them."

Yeah, I hate to be the bearer of the obvious, but...math and science have NEVER been interesting to students, with the possible exception of astronomy/physics.
Sorry, kids, but math and science are boring subjects...at least until your get to the higher levels.
I think I bristle instinctively at the whole "make math and science interesting to kids today" thing because there is just *SO* much potential to completely miss the forest for the trees.
I suppose if we're talking about 10th-12th graders, it's a different story. But I don't see where the wisdom is in asking kids under the age of around 14 to thing abstractly on the fundamentals of ANY curriculum.
On the other hand, schools also really need to realize the importance of teaching kids HOW to actually THINK at a young age.

"Ask any gamer who's gotten a 100 percent completion in Grand Theft Auto III if they were inclined to give up because it was "too hard."

...are we talking about the same people who were bitching that Twilight Princess was too long and hard?

Leshrac @ Mar 5th 2007 12:46AM

It does seem kind of ridiculous... I obviously have no proof or numbers to back me up, but my guess is that kids that play videogames are actually probably BETTER at math and science than kids that don't play games. Obviously, this could go both ways, and if your a kid that ONLY plays videogames to the detriment of everything else in your life, it'll obviously have a negative effect... but if you play videogames a "normal" amount and still get your homework done, etc, my guess is that those are the kids that are better at math and science.

-Leshrac
http://alinktothefuture.com

Free Playstation PS3 @ Mar 5th 2007 5:15AM

Seems a bit of a generalisation to me, playing console games and wanting to get into making them is a big driver of people wanting to take up computing more seriously, then they realise that to make a great car game you need to understand physics, and it all moves on from there. It's the teaching that is so dry and outdated.

t_m @ Mar 5th 2007 5:47AM

I always thought the school system should take a leaf out of gaming's books.

Structure schools more like cRPGs, where kids need to complete goals, gain achievement points and "level up".

Heck, i think i've learnt more of my times table from Brain Training than i did in 10 years of maths at school. (and been more motivated to continue than i ever was at school. )

If ids are willing to sped hours repetetivley playing games to get the last achievement point.. why not tap into that to get them to spend hours repetetively doing maths and english?/?

Joonas @ Mar 5th 2007 5:49AM

It looks like nobody mentioned the book on this: Everything Bad Is Good for You: How Today's Popular Culture Is Actually Making Us Smarter by Steven Johnson. It's got a lot on games and makes a convinving case for how they challenge and make kids think, shifting the focus away from the childish (and disposable) subject matter and into the cognitive processes that are taking place. Recommended. It also covers TV and movies.