From a meeting of minds

Randy: Hello Room
alicia: hi gamers
josue: wazuuuup!
Sergio Figueiredo: so... about educational video games
Sergio Figueiredo: what are they?
josue: great segue
Randy: yeah...
Sergio Figueiredo: so what is the difference between video game learning and digital based learning?
josue: procedural rhetorics?
alicia: yes, josue
josue: sans (s)
Sergio Figueiredo: it seems that procedural rhet has to do with all technology
Sergio Figueiredo: does that seem right?
Randy: How abotu Digital Game Based Learning? Didn;t this chapter remind you of Prensky?
josue: agreed
Sergio Figueiredo: who is that?
alicia: it did me, randy
Randy: Mark Prensky - Digital Games based Learning
josue: what is the argument?
Randy: here's a link to his site: http://www.twitchspeed.com/
josue: oooo nice site!
Sergio Figueiredo: Josie just said that"vg" sounds like a disease
alicia: that games have taken on a connotation as being *only* associated with entertainment, but that you can NOT ONLY learn through a game, but possibly learn BETTER than if the same info was delivered in a non-game medium
alicia: that's Prensky's thesis
josue: this reminds me of the same credibility checks that other media have had to endure and finally overcome
Randy: Presnky's big claim - as I remember it - is that learnign shoudl be FUN!!!
Sergio Figueiredo: some dude named Daniel has something like that in 75 called INFOTAINMENT
Sergio Figueiredo: sounds oddly like EDUTAINMENT
Randy: hmmm
alicia: and, in fact, that people have been learning through games (c.f. the games Presky has on his site) all along, so we shouldn't be squeamish about bringing games into the classroom and into business
josue: the difference is that you can really leran thu videogames, while other media present more of a content based learning
anastasi: what about reinforcement theory?
alicia: i think "edutainment" is a word prensky uses, actually
josue: or at least the possibility is there
josue: that's an awful word
Sergio Figueiredo: ok, i get that, but what is Bogost adding to the conversation?
alicia: yes, games present really powerful reinforcers---perhaps at the procedural level
josue: edutainment looks, at first glance, like "adult entertainment!
anastasi: It must have something to do with the intellect, based on Maria Montessori's approach.
Sergio Figueiredo: like the XXX industry
josue: yes
Randy: Wasn;t that Vin Deisel?
josue: and yes
Sergio Figueiredo: haha
josue: and no
Randy: or is that a professional wressler? XXX?
Sergio Figueiredo: that was Ron Mexico
josue: he does add a convincing argument against both behaviorist and constructivist approaches
anastasi: he says Videogames "cultivate higher order thinking skills. Like which ones?
josue: which I think needs to be kept alive
josue: um.....
alicia: like planning
josue: planning?
alicia: that's like, totally, a higher order activity
josue: what do you mean by "planning?"
alicia: like, with the McVideo game
Randy: does that have to do with rules and strategy?
alicia: ok, so what i really meant was strategy
Randy: i see
josue: you are smart Randy
Sergio Figueiredo: which seems like procedures, right?
Randy: exactly...
anastasi: does it have to do with situated meanings, and embodied learning conected to 'particular" worlds and relationships (241)?
Sergio Figueiredo: then, what doe we think of what bogost says at the end: "videogames develop procedural LITERACY"?
Sergio Figueiredo: is isn't a literacy if it is visual... it is a visualicity
josue: i don't like his use of literacy though
Sergio Figueiredo: i agree
Randy: Well I think Bogost is getting at the fact that this "literacy"...
Randy: is developed as a sort of co-creation...
josue: we have had the same arguments about visual literacy, or media literacy
anastasi: there is something about semiotic domains (243) that speaks to embodied experience
Randy: between the designer, game (procedures) and the user's interaction.
josue: but is this a literacy?
Sergio Figueiredo: i don't think so... i think it is a seeing
Sergio Figueiredo: a "see-icity"?
josue: a voyeaurism?
alicia: *ahem* "videogame players develop procedural literacy through interacting with the abstract models of specific real or imagined processes presented in the games they play. Videogames teach BAISSED presepctives about how things work. AND THE WAY THEY TEACH SUCH PERSPECTIVES IS THROUGH PROCEDURAL RHETORICS" (260)
Sergio Figueiredo: yes, i am looking at your body ... in the game... as my fetish
alicia: so, procedural rhetorics make all the difference
anastasi: I think it is literacy in as far as the learned experiences go, don't you?
Randy: good question, much like the question as to whether "procedural rhetorics" is acutally a new rhetoric?
alicia: New Rhetoric
Randy: NeuvoRhetorica
Sergio Figueiredo: a New Rhetoric, like a New Criticism?
Randy: NeoRhetoricus
josue: maybe not new, but perhapsrehabilitated
alicia: as amanda said, "i think anything with 'new' before it as an adjactive is inherently NOT new"
Sergio Figueiredo: What about a Player Response theory, rather than a Reader Response theory?
josue: you'd have to
Randy: now you're onto something!!
josue: have one
Randy: Let's get Katz on the Guitar!
josue: Bogost does discuss this somewhat in regards to the Playmobil toys
Sergio Figueiredo: so this seems like a game, interwining conversations, and trying to keep up with them.... the procedure is all over the place and we are still learning and developing new though
alicia: dudes -- can games be "read" like texts??
Sergio Figueiredo: this doesn't fit in to his Procedural Rhetoric
Randy: Can we consider the "game" or "toy" a text? What happens with Playmobil in this way
josue: that you must play by the rules to break the rules
josue: NOOOOOO!!!!!!
alicia: if so, then there could be a Player response theory
Sergio Figueiredo: can we read movies josh?
josue: j/k you can
Sergio Figueiredo: aren't VGs the new movies?
Sergio Figueiredo: YES!!
josue: if you want to be phallologocentrist
Randy: hmmm - so the interaction in games - or with Legos - is a kinfd of writing?
josue: VGs are the new movies, and movies are the new VGs
anastasi: My question is: are we all capable of writing processes, esp in as far as writing computer programs
alicia: the playmobil thing is weird....i didn't think there were rules to playing with those toys
alicia: since they're TOYS and all
alicia: and, you know, toys sans rules
josue: Playmobil has rules, as far as the themes of the particular set - like procedures in VGs
Sergio Figueiredo: is it writing though? It seems that bogost is arguing that it is a creating.... creating a world, a culture and through that culture is where we learn through procedural rhet.
alicia: how does theme = rule?
Randy: BUT... with Playmobil you can"leave" the area of play - unlike the hard rules of procedural rhetoric, right?
alicia: maybe not, randy. paradigms are all around us.
Randy: I mean, you could put your playmobil toys in the toilet and flush...
josue: it doesn't, in any strict sense of the word. but it does encourage a certain way to play and make connections, which of course are then subverted.
Sergio Figueiredo: is the computer, then, a black bod?
Sergio Figueiredo: box*
josue: sexxxy
Randy: ah - so i see - I have left the non-toilet paradigm for the toileet paradigm
Randy: hmmm
josue: are you designing a toilet in 2L or something Randy?
Randy: not me - that seems an ambitious project
Sergio Figueiredo: just make it a portal... to the clemson experiemental island
alicia: so, is procedural rhetoric ultimately a form of brainwashing?
josue: LOL
josue: wow, that's a srong word...
josue: lemmee see
alicia: i know it was
alicia: maybe explain to me how it's NOT
Sergio Figueiredo: i don't think so if the game has some allowances, like GTA 4
anastasi: I get it; procedural literacy is about understanding the logic underpinning the behavior see page 258
josue: no, it is a orm of play, in a very post-structuralist sense of the word play.
Randy: i don;t think i would call it that, but after playing October 12,... nevermind
Sergio Figueiredo: if you can play without being too restricted by the rules, as we saw a few weeks ago, we are allowed to create out own experience... but yes... only within the theme
Randy: good point
alicia: *nods* i see it from the play perspective...however, i would argue that invoking those post-structuralist connotations actually makes my point about brainwashing
josue: eleborate
Randy: She must be stopped
josue: e = a
Sergio Figueiredo: but isn't that part of the goal of "Education" in the traditional sense
Randy: she is questioning our whole system of procedural rhetorical rule
Randy: serg makes sense
anastasi: the last word is on page 260..videogames "teach biased perspectives about how things work through engaging players directly and through criticism
Randy: At least, sergge, from the approach of instrumentality in education
Sergio Figueiredo: yeah
josue: i don't think that the designers intended any such "play" with their toy
alicia: you're assuming people are good
Randy: didn't they, josh, didn;t they?
Sergio Figueiredo: are you being cynical again?
alicia: what kind of play did the designers of WoW intend?
Randy: Wow!
Sergio Figueiredo: is it all for the money? - Method Man's "C.R.E.A.M."
Randy: (no i really meant - wow)
alicia: WoW pushes a capitalist agenda
Sergio Figueiredo: yeah... so does SL
Randy: and depends on a capitalist model?
alicia: the communal aspects are only there to get you to stay and spend more money
Randy: well... this raises some great questions - let.s continue this!
Sergio Figueiredo: yeah.. and in SL, you are expected to actually use real money to buy game money
josue: I think this capitalist agenda is, as Baudrillard would say, a "bloated" ideology; one that tries to say too much...
Sergio Figueiredo: isn't it then, just a simulation of reality
alicia: ok, so i'm being reductive
alicia: but i'm trying to get back to that brainwashing point
Sergio Figueiredo: brainwashing, conditioning to waht we already know - just another re-inforcement
alicia: see, it's working.........
Sergio Figueiredo: just getting there in a round-a-bout way
Sergio Figueiredo: So, in conclusion....
josue: the ideology itself includes these possibilities because it says "too muc"
josue: much
Sergio Figueiredo: we need a Player Response Theory
Sergio Figueiredo: Games can't be taken out of the capitalist structure of society
josue: of course not
alicia: well, in theory, you could construct a game that would push a socialist agenda, make it just as addictive as WoW, and, suddenly, Obama;s plans wouldn't look so bad anymore
alicia: ;]
josue: they recapitulate in a lot of ways,
Sergio Figueiredo: so can we argue for communism using a "Sims" type game
alicia: yeah, seems so
alicia: sorta
josue: not in the same way, no
Sergio Figueiredo: in-game, that is
josue: well, maybe a little commie
Sergio Figueiredo: as in "communal"
Sergio Figueiredo: , just to clear that up
Sergio Figueiredo: language scholars
josue: as in the diminunitive of communist
Sergio Figueiredo: ok... my batter is about to die
Sergio Figueiredo: i am out, but i will be posting this - *battery
josue: is it a phillie pitcher?
Sergio Figueiredo: Hamels goes tonight at 8:22ppm
Sergio Figueiredo: just to the exta emphasis
Sergio Figueiredo: later
josue: good, nothing is settled, but nothing is ever settled, or shouldn't be