Review+of+Scholarly+Work

=// Before every child is left behind: //= =// How epistemic games can solve the coming crisis in education //=

James Paul Gee*


Review for content and applicability to Cy-Springs HS, a large Title I campus in Cypress, TX, immediately to the Northwest of Houston.

David Shaffer and James Gee have written a very interesting paper on the future of education. The paper can be divided into two parts: The Crisis, and The Solution. In describing the crisis as they see it, they talk about jobs in one of two categories. Jobs are either "commodity jobs" or jobs that revolve around "innovative work". They contend that the educational system in America overwhelmingly favors the former, but the economy of the future is going to demand the latter.

// "A commodity is a standardized product or service available to a // // mass audience at a reasonable price. The “old capitalism”—the capitalism of industry, // // manufacturing, assembly lines, and large corporations heavy with middle managers—the // // capitalism of the post World War II world—a capitalism that was vastly successful in producing // // a massive middle-class in the United States—was built on the production and sale of // //commodities.//" (Shaffer & Gee, 2005) ~

// "The looming crisis is that counties like India and China // // are not content simply to remain the commodity servants of the U.S. economy. And why should // // they be? They are now moving up the value chain themselves to produce people who can // // innovate. People who view their work not in terms of standard skills, but in terms of new ideas // // and new relationships. Countries with growing economies are gearing up their universities and // // their entrepreneurial centers to produce innovative work and innovative workers." // (Shaffer & Gee, 2005)   ~ In order for America to succeed in the new economy, we need to shed our reliance on a system that only produces commodity jobs with standard skills that can be out-sourced anywhere on the globe. I think that there is a lot of wisdom in looking at the American economy differently than we have in the past. We are producing products still, but we are increasingly relying on innovators as the real drivers of economic growth. There's a sense in which that's always been true, but in an age where one can communicate with a counterpart halfway across the globe while looking at the same documents in real time, there seems to me to be some sense in moving beyond the stereotypical manufacturing job style of teaching in our schools. That said, the authors are making some assumptions that need to be brought out. First, they assume that there aren't other pressures and factors at work in countries like China and India that might prevent them from accomplishing global dominance in the ways in which the authors suggest. For example, China (as a result of its one-child policy) has a hugely disproportionate number of males who have zero prospects of marriage and family life. The impact of this imbalance will cause serious problems for the Chinese government and ultimately the Chinese economy as these generations age and become a drain on the economy rather than a driver. In other words, direct comparisons between the Chinese or Indian situation with the American situation might lead the reader to conclude that Indians and the Chinese are just like Americans and live in a country just like America, in that they will inevitably take over the world (economically speaking) because that's what happened here under similar circumstances. The reality behind international relationships I think is a good deal more complicated than that. Another assumption that isn't made explicit but is implied in the paper is that the sole purpose of an education is to get a job. Not just a job, but the sort of job that will propel this country into a place of global economic leadership. Jobs are not bad things to be sure, but we have truly been wasting our time indeed if in fact job-securing is the only reason to send your kids to school. A friend of mine who is a native of the Philippines told me that if his elementary school age daughters had remained in school there, they would have been taught only 4 subjects: Computers, Math, English, and Mandarin. I'll grant you that in today's technologically rich economy, there's a clear logic to those choices. But a student who only learns these things might grow up to be fabulously wealthy but have no sense of history, civics, art, music, etc. How important are these things? Admittedly, the paper is not extremely long and doesn't dwell on any one point. Perhaps some balance would be introduced in further works or in conversation with these two authors. But given their solution, the above points should be kept in mind. In using the phrase "epistemic games" the authors mean games that are based around knowledge and not simply shoot-em-ups. These games will capture the minds of young people who are playing games incessantly anyway, and prepare them for future innovative work. The games revolve around applying knowledge gained through the game. This is the key distinction that the authors hope to make. Students in the current system are not often asked to apply what they've learned, they are just asked to regurgitate what they've been taught. The epistemic games by contrast, expect the player to learn facts and processes and then apply them to new situations. This is a key skill set that the modern student entering the 21st century work force will need. There's much to be said for this approach. As the parent of a 4-yr. old, my wife and I are going to be making some important decisions about how are child will be educated. Our economy is increasingly becoming a knowledge economy. As such, the economy's participants must not only be knowledgeable, but able to apply their knowledge and skills in new ways. I'm not completely convinced that games are the only way to do this, but I think that some degree of knowledge based or "epistemic" game play would have some salutary effects on a child in today's world. What I'm having trouble envisioning is a school environment in which every classroom is dominated by game play. There needs to be room for real interaction with adults. There needs to be a balance. Cy-Springs HS could use some of these ideas. The game-play would be immensely popular, but would need to be tempered with traditional instruction. Regardless, students need training on how to interact respectfully with each other and with adults while online. There seems to be very little of this right now.

Shaffer, D., & Gee, J. (2005). Before every child is left behind: How epistemic games can solve the coming crisis in education. Informally published manuscript, Academic Advanced Distributed Learning Co-Laboratory, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI. , Available from ERIC. (ED497010)Retrieved from http://www.academiccolab.org/resources/documents/learning_crisis.pdf