Looking where the light is bad: Video games and the future of assessment

In the past we have referred to games as good “learning engines.” Here we argue that games are good learning engines because they are first good assessment engines. Games require the kind of thinking that we need in the 21 st Century because they use actual learning as the basis for assessment. They test not only current knowledge and skills, but also preparation for future learning. They measure 21st Century skills like collaboration, innovation, production, and design by tracking many different kinds of information about a student, over time. Thus we suggest that the road to better schools starts by making the tests in school more like the games that students are already playing out of school. Not so funny anymore There’s an old joke: A man parks his car on a dark street and drops his keys while trying to lock the door. So he goes into a bar nearby to try to find them. It’s so dark on the street, he thinks, that he’s better off looking in the bar where the light is good. It’s a funny joke... or so we thought until we realized that all of us who study video games and learning have been in a bar for the last decade, looking for our keys. Beside the point We’ve argued before that video games are good for learning [1-3] and by “video games” here we mean any game played on a computer and or game system, online, handheld, or otherwise. Video games are good for learning because games can create virtual worlds where 1 James Paul Gee is the Mary Lou Fulton Presidential Professor of Learning Studies at Arizona State University. David Williamson Shaffer is Professor of Learning Science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. They are equal coauthors with names listed alphabetically.