In class, Becky brought up the example of learning US state capitals as something that you need a test for to ensure students are retaining information. This reminded me of something I had completely forgotten about: the way I learned the US state capitals in fifth grade. My class played a competitive game every day to help us memorize the state capitals. We were divided into two teams: The Capital Connoisseurs and The National Know-It-Alls. Each team would send up a representative to the front of the room, and my teacher would name a state. The first person to say the capital of the state got a point. We kept score every day, and at the end, the winning team got their name put on a big trophy our teacher had bought. This was such a fun and effective way to learn something pretty mundane. Everyone had learned the capitals within a few weeks, because we all wanted to win. The winning team didn't get a better grade; this was just a game. We retained this information better than we would have if we had taken one test on it and moved on. Not only that, but we loved playing that game, so learning the capitals became something fun. Most humans enjoy friendly competition, so I think this is a great way to teach kids something that might otherwise be boring to them.
Question: Have you ever used games as a way to learn something?
Hey Emily, interesting post. I responded to it.
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