As children, most college students of today grew up with
access to computers and to educational games.
Playing learning-focused games is a widely accepted activity for
children because it helps develop children’s basic academic skills while
engaging them in fun activities. Now
that you’re in college or about to go to college, the fun and learning games
are over, right? Not necessarily.
Websites such as Eduxtive,
which is mostly geared toward younger learners, also can contain games suitable
for the post-high school audience. For
example, I was very challenged by The World
History Game and played it several times to try to increase my score. I found myself recalling information from my
community college history courses (over 20 years ago!) and taking in some new
knowledge along the way. The game is
divided into seven sections to test a broad array of history knowledge. The chronology section calls on the player to
arrange several important world events in the order in which they occurred. The fact checker section is much like a
traditional multiple choice quiz, and the geo skills directs the player to
match up historical hallmarks with the region in which they occurred. The important people, key terms, and culture
and lands sections complete the game, and the player is given a report card
showing his or her score on each section and an overall letter grade. (No, I’m not saying what my letter grade
was.) This scoring method will help a
student to track improvements over time and to identify what areas of knowledge
need further study and attention. This
would be a nice tool for students wishing to refresh their world history background
before taking college history classes. I
did find the game sounds a trifle annoying, but they are easy to turn off if
you wish. I was also pleased to find
helpful math and science games on the Eduxtive
site as well.
While this is a sponsored post for which I am being paid a
nominal amount, I have long used game and study websites, both those geared for
K-12 and college audiences, as support material for my classes. There is a ton of good teaching resources out
there just for the googling of them. For
that matter, savvy students can support their own learning by searching for
game and study websites related to class subjects. Sometimes having a little fun with the
learning makes it stick all that much better.
