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Possibly. Any "real world" application would have been better than just theory. But games seem like a natural extension of math lessons, and who doesn't like ga

Possibly. Any "real world" application would have been better than just theory. But games seem like a natural extension of math lessons, and who doesn't like games?

dutchflyboy 17y ago
I agree, it's not a case of "What works for me must work for everyone" but more a case of "applying theory helps learning, especially when it's fun". I still haven't found anyone who doesn't like any game, so as long as there are a few different possibilities it DOES work for everyone.
nailer 17y ago
Agreed. I remember learning trig at high school, without any motivation being presented whatsoever. Just 'lets calculate what this equation looks like' - what it came time to the government mandated project, there was a practical use - graphing the movement of a pendulum clock - which made it much easier to learn. And yes, who doesn't like games?
RiderOfGiraffes 17y ago
Well, just to provide a single example, my wife is totally disinterested in games. Absolutely doesn't care, to the point where if someone tries to motivate topic X via games she ends up feeling that topic X cannot have any value to her at all. By contrast, she is very interested in math, and wishes that at school it had been presented as other than a collection of facts to memorize and processes to learn and apply. I know of others who have a similar attitude to games, and now, as I approach 50, I can't care much about them either. Games aren't "Real World." If you want "Real World" motivation then find some stuff from the real world. To add some context, I am passionate about putting things in context and making them relevant. I visit schools to talk about uses of math, and explaining how these subjects are anything but isolated and irrelevant stuff to learn and hoops to jump through. I've given talks in venues such as the West Yorkshore Playhouse, the Royal Exchange in Manchester, the Criterion Theatre in the West End of London, Navy Pier in Chicago, and others around the world. I give examples from GPS and SatNav through intercepting drugs couriers and on to gene splicing and DNA analysis. I talk about finding cliques and connections in social networks, and then apply that to detecting plaigarism and ranking web sites. I talk about weather forecasting, roulette, life assurance and debt management. I mention them in passing when relevant, but I don't talk much about games.
- oscardelben 17y ago
  At school, usually the vast majority of people is interested in games. Of course you can never satisfy everyone, but that's not a good reason IMO to not do anything just because a few people might not like it.
  - RiderOfGiraffes 17y ago
    > At school, usually the vast majority of people is interested in games. "People" or "boys" ?? I'd be interested to know your basis for your assertion, and now that the question has been raised I'll start taking informal polls as I go out and give talks. I do about 90 talks a year, and I'll see what the feedback is. And in what aspect of games? Being interested in playing various games is not the same as caring how they work, or caring about the idea that math is used in them. I'm not saying that games can't or shouldn't be used as motivation, but I have grave doubts as to the ubiquity of the appeal that people here seem to be taking for granted. To some extent it's the extremity of the view to which I'm objecting. chaosmachine earlier said: > All math classes should incorporate game programming I really can't believe that such an extreme view is a good thing. It would be akin to saying: Actually math isn't interesting in its own right, we really just need it to write really cool games. Leaving aside that particular comment, I still think that tying math only to applications is a bad thing. Motivation is essential, yes, but sometimes there's math that arises from the math, and only finds application much later, if ever. In short, my personal feeling is that you're wrong that the vast majority of kids would be motivated by games, but I have no stats to back that up, just 25 years of giving talks to school kids. Majority, maybe. Substantial proportion, probably. Far better to get the motivation by using math in a wide, wide range of applications. It's motivation at all, and the sheer breadth that really matters.
    - chaosmachine 17y ago
      chaosmachine earlier said: All math classes should incorporate game programming Just to clarify, that was kind of a joke. At least, it wasn't meant to be taken as an all or nothing extremist demand. If I was going to rewrite that comment, knowing it would be taken literally, it might read something more like: All math classes should incorporate fun "real world" applications, beyond just theory. More people would pay attention.

Possibly. Any "real world" application would have been better than just theory. But games seem like a natural extension of math lessons, and who doesn't like games?

dutchflyboy 17y ago

I agree, it's not a case of "What works for me must work for everyone" but more a case of "applying theory helps learning, especially when it's fun". I still haven't found anyone who doesn't like any game, so as long as there are a few different possibilities it DOES work for everyone.

nailer 17y ago

Agreed. I remember learning trig at high school, without any motivation being presented whatsoever. Just 'lets calculate what this equation looks like' - what it came time to the government mandated project, there was a practical use - graphing the movement of a pendulum clock - which made it much easier to learn. And yes, who doesn't like games?

RiderOfGiraffes 17y ago

Well, just to provide a single example, my wife is totally disinterested in games. Absolutely doesn't care, to the point where if someone tries to motivate topic X via games she ends up feeling that topic X cannot have any value to her at all. By contrast, she is very interested in math, and wishes that at school it had been presented as other than a collection of facts to memorize and processes to learn and apply. I know of others who have a similar attitude to games, and now, as I approach 50, I can't care much about them either. Games aren't "Real World." If you want "Real World" motivation then find some stuff from the real world. To add some context, I am passionate about putting things in context and making them relevant. I visit schools to talk about uses of math, and explaining how these subjects are anything but isolated and irrelevant stuff to learn and hoops to jump through. I've given talks in venues such as the West Yorkshore Playhouse, the Royal Exchange in Manchester, the Criterion Theatre in the West End of London, Navy Pier in Chicago, and others around the world. I give examples from GPS and SatNav through intercepting drugs couriers and on to gene splicing and DNA analysis. I talk about finding cliques and connections in social networks, and then apply that to detecting plaigarism and ranking web sites. I talk about weather forecasting, roulette, life assurance and debt management. I mention them in passing when relevant, but I don't talk much about games.

oscardelben 17y ago
At school, usually the vast majority of people is interested in games. Of course you can never satisfy everyone, but that's not a good reason IMO to not do anything just because a few people might not like it.
- RiderOfGiraffes 17y ago
  > At school, usually the vast majority of people is interested in games. "People" or "boys" ?? I'd be interested to know your basis for your assertion, and now that the question has been raised I'll start taking informal polls as I go out and give talks. I do about 90 talks a year, and I'll see what the feedback is. And in what aspect of games? Being interested in playing various games is not the same as caring how they work, or caring about the idea that math is used in them. I'm not saying that games can't or shouldn't be used as motivation, but I have grave doubts as to the ubiquity of the appeal that people here seem to be taking for granted. To some extent it's the extremity of the view to which I'm objecting. chaosmachine earlier said: > All math classes should incorporate game programming I really can't believe that such an extreme view is a good thing. It would be akin to saying: Actually math isn't interesting in its own right, we really just need it to write really cool games. Leaving aside that particular comment, I still think that tying math only to applications is a bad thing. Motivation is essential, yes, but sometimes there's math that arises from the math, and only finds application much later, if ever. In short, my personal feeling is that you're wrong that the vast majority of kids would be motivated by games, but I have no stats to back that up, just 25 years of giving talks to school kids. Majority, maybe. Substantial proportion, probably. Far better to get the motivation by using math in a wide, wide range of applications. It's motivation at all, and the sheer breadth that really matters.
  - chaosmachine 17y ago
    chaosmachine earlier said: All math classes should incorporate game programming Just to clarify, that was kind of a joke. At least, it wasn't meant to be taken as an all or nothing extremist demand. If I was going to rewrite that comment, knowing it would be taken literally, it might read something more like: All math classes should incorporate fun "real world" applications, beyond just theory. More people would pay attention.