“Our Lesson for Today is… MMORPG”

SINGAPORE—Some of you may think that school and games don’t mix. But what if I tell you that 1 month from now, atleast two schools will be adopting MMORPG as a part of the curriculum? Unfortunately, two of these schools aren’t named yet since everything is not finalized.

According to Assistant Professor Muhammad Faishal Ibrahim, “I see gaming as a new and broadened platform for learning, and by making it interesting to students, it will help motivate them to learn new skills.”

But what game will be introduced by this curriculum? After a focus group discussion between teachers, principals, students, councellors and academics they have selected Granado Espada.

The Director of Education Initiatives at Infocomm Asia Holdings, Mr. Thomas Chong, which is leading the initiative, defended that it’s not a typical “slash-and-kill” game, rather it can help the player/student to develop critical thinking and decision making.

“This is not an educational game dressed up as an MMOG (massively-multi-player online game). Rather, we want to ask students whether, say, a war can be won without fighting, but instead by signing a treaty? We want them to see the merits of discussion, strategising, and coming up with alternative ideas,” he said.

Singapore is the first country in the world to use Granado Espada as a Learning tool.

Source: Learning by joystick By Lee U-Wen, TODAY

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~ by The Doctor on February 8, 2007.