Highland Fun and Games [based learning]

Today I had my hair curled but not at the hairdresser, I was also told that I definitely had green eyes, my nose was not a triangle and even though I was big I could be small today just like everyone else but everyone else didn't need to be small because they could choose to be big but today I was going to be small.

To put this all into context for you I had set off this morning to visit a nursery class in an Aberdeenshire primary school that has been using Wii Music as a learning context.  After a rather typical journey I arrived just in time to help create a mii for me.  Telling the children that I had not made a mii before led them to give me a wonderful tutorial on how to create your own character on the Wii.  Did you know that your mii can look like anything you want it to?

"It doesn't need to look like you as long as you can find it in the mii plaza." (C, age 4)

Behind the scenes the planning and organisation that has gone into this project has undoubtedly aided it's success yet there has been the flexibility for the children to lead their own adventure.  The game may have been Wii Music but the learning that has evolved has focused on collaborative working, turn taking, numeracy development and environmental language exposure.  The areas of the game that an older child may often choose to skip through proved to be some of the more popular areas for the nursery children with their favourite activities including watching the video replay of their jam session and creating album covers for their dvd within the game.  (It should be noted that the curricular links given are not limited and there are many further links that are relevant)  The jam sessions themselves provided the perfect opportunity for immersive role play during which the children enjoyed being rock stars choosing their preferred instruments, most popular were the electric guitar and the drum kit.  The children became experienced at identifying the various instruments used within the game and learned musical terminology and vocabulary.  The teacher noted that the development of rhythm and tempo were areas that did not progress well despite this being the obvious expectation that one may associate with such an activity.

Something that the nursery I visited demonstrated very well was the home school partnership.  Parents were informed throughout the project and provided feedback (via forms) sharing their experience of their child's progress.  The staff created visually stimulating displays consisting of photographs and key words relating to the learning experience and information was added to the children's 'learning stories' books which provide a snapshot of some of the experiences each child has encountered while in the nursery setting.  The children also completed feedback sheets using the traffic light system (which is used throughout the school) and comments scribed by staff.  All but two of the children chose green to represent their enjoyment of the project where green symbolised "really enjoyed it", the two other children chose orange, representing "it was ok".  In terms of class feedback this in itself is pretty impressive and demonstrates the enjoyment provided by the use of the game.

The use of the Wii was limited within the nursery but not during a session.  The area containing the wii became another context area for the children and in this way it was not limited but rather the days when the wii was used became the control method.  I believe that this kept the interest in the game as the children were excited when the wii was out rather than it becoming just another area.

There was also time for whole nursery activities when everyone would gather together as a group to watch aspects of the game and discuss progress.  All children created their own mii and were able to identify their character from the mii parade.  This was extended by the children drawing a black line representation of their mii.  The level of detail in each drawing from children who were both 3 and 4 demonstrated a clear stimulation and motivation for the task.  The awareness of self involved in creating the mii characters is an area that I had not considered when introducing the Nintendo Wii into a class or nursery setting yet it is also an area that holds a great deal of potential for first time use.

Prior to my visit I had the opportunity of accessing the glow group for the school which included the planning materials and evaluations.  I am particularly grateful to everyone that helped me in arranging this visit and to the school and staff for letting me visit.  The idea of learning being multi-dimensional (Muschamp, 2010)was the motivating factor for why I arranged the visit.  The information available through glow could only provide me with so much information but the experience of witnessing the children engaging with the technology provided an insight than cannot be described on paper.  I have learned a lot personally about the practicalities of GBL in a real context in an early years setting and along the way I have also learned a lot about the potential of glow.  Next steps for me include my own wii based project which begins next week...