The Play Ethic

New school based on computer gameplay

Startling news from a Play Ethic friend, Eric Zimmerman of GameLab, that they're getting over a million dollars to start up a new school in New York which uses "gaming and design" as its primary teaching methodology. The full press release is in extended post, and they've also included a piece on NPR by Heather Chaplin (another PE friend, and a co-author of the videogame history Smart Bomb.) Here's an exciting chunk of ludological pedagogy for ya:

“We are conceiving the school as a dynamic learning system that takes its cues from the way games are designed, shared and played,” said Katie Salen,Executive Director of the Gamelab Institute of Play. “All players in the school – teachers, students,parents and administrators – will be empowered to innovate using 21st century literacies that are native to games and design. This means learning to think about the   world as a set of in interconnected systems that can be affected or changed through action and choice, the ability to navigate complex information networks, the power to build worlds and tell stories, to see collaboration in competition, and communicate across diverse social spaces. It means that students and teachers will engage in their own learning in powerful ways.”

Harry Potter World: Scotland, not Orlando

Not entirely serious article from me in Comment is free, about the sheer inappropriateness of the proposed Harry Potter theme park going to Orlando, Florida, rather than what I regard as the book's spiritual home, Scotland. Most of the subsequent commentary seems to revolve around my use of the term "flourescent fanny-pack", which I now only half regret. It's also an example of my revived 'constitutional patriotism', in the aftermath of the Scottish elections which saw a social-democratic party committed to independence (SNP) take power in the Parliament. My enthusiasms are expressed in my contributions to the progressive weblog, Scottish Futures.