Videojuegos

What Videogame Making Can Teach Us About Literacy and Learning: Alternative Pathways into Participatory Culture
Kylie Peppler & Yasmin B. Kafai
University of California, Los Angeles 2331 Moore Hall 951521 Los Angeles, CA 90095-1521 kpeppler@ucla.edu & kafai@gseis.ucla.edu
ABSTRACT

In this paper we articulate an alternative approach to look at video games and learning to become a creator andcontributor in the digital culture. Previous discussions have focused mostly on playing games and learning. Here, we discuss game making approaches and their benefits for illuminating game preferences and learning both software design and other academic content. We report on an ongoing ethnographic study that documents youth producing video games in a community design studio. We illustrate howvideo game making can provide a context for addressing issues of participation, transparency and ethics.
Author Keywords

scripting does not touch the backbones of game design – all modifications are within prescribed parameters. For this paper, we want to bring back the approach of making games for learning, but situate its contribution within the current debates of the participatory culture[12]. In Jenkins’ view, video game play is part of the larger digital culture and the majority of youth are already contributors and producers of media when looking at social networking and blogging sites [27]. He articulated three issues that policymakers and educators face as they attempt to bridge the gap between those that contribute and those that don’t: the participation gap, the transparencyproblem, and the ethics challenge. These three issues encompass the need to ensure that every young person has access to the skills and experience needed to become a full participant, can articulate their understanding of how media shapes perception, and is knowledgeable of emerging ethical standards that shape their practices as media makers and participants in online communities [12]. We agreewith these challenges, but want to expand on media production as an alternative and complementary pathway for learning and participation in today’s media culture. We will use these challenges as our framework to examine the production of game making practices for learning that took place in a Computer Clubhouse, an informal, after-school program.
BACKGROUND

Education, Video Game Making,Learning, Literacy Practices, Media Education, Urban Youth
INTRODUCTION

The publication of Jim Gee’s “What videogames teach us about learning and literacy” [8] has jumpstarted a long overdue discussion about video games and learning in the academic and public arena. In this book, Gee articulated a collection of learning principles involved in playing video games and becoming part of the gamingcommunity. Other researchers have demonstrated how participation in game communities involves apprenticeship and how games, such as Civilization™, can be used in classrooms to examine how the understanding of history is fostered [33, 34, 36]. On the public side, movements such as the Serious Games initiative have highlighted role-playing games for learning in military, health and other professionalcontexts [9]. Noticeably absent from all these discussions is another promising context – the making of games for learning [16]. From this perspective, game players program their own games and learn about software and interface design. Some efforts have integrated the learning of subject matter, such as mathematics and science, within game making activities [13]. Most current commercial games havecustomization features that allow the player to tailor their characters and edit new levels for games. But in our view, this kind of

We see our approach as part of a larger group of work concerned with the educational value of video games. Most prominent within this field are approaches that examine educational computer game play for learning specific subject matter. There are many notable...