The Adventure of Links: Week of August 11th

I missed my "Adventure of Link" links last week, although I had the links combined. A head cold hit me and I woke up out of the haze to realize that it is Thursday. Well, here are some links for this week.

Using traditional games for educational purposes:

Instead of making serious games for education, why not embrace traditional gaming to enhance kids' lives?

The concept and the discussion in the article are good. We talk about games having educational and critical thinking value, but we in academic libraries work to create games to our specific needs. If we looked at games that were out there and the skills they taught, we could not only use their strategies (an application I promote), but we could use the game itself to help teach. Problem puzzles deep in a temple of a Zelda game? Logic puzzle from a Telltale adventure game? Physics challenges and predictions from a FPS? Games provide applications of educational concepts that we could use. GameSetWatch also ran the article from Serious Games Source.

Which is it? A serious game or a simulation?
Clark Aldrich has a quick post talking about each on his site. I think it is easy to blur the line when thinking of what we want to create or what we want our students to experience. The line can also be blurred when discussing educational gaming with administrators. Clark puts it as such:

But what is also tough is when people confuse serious games and educational simulations. Now these are obviously much closer together in any taxonomy. But serious games are light experiences that are easy and fun to engage while building awareness, and educational simulations rigorous develop skills and capabilities.

Cerise weighs in on game cannon:
I've mentioned the quality work at Cerise before. This article looks at the ongoing debate of if games are art/expression or have value... what is the core group of titles. What is the gaming cannon?

Gaming on a grown-up's budget:
Mister Raroo drew criticism from some gaming libraries with his initial column, but his most recent one is a good read for any "grown-up" with a gaming passion. Sometimes our passions and our pocketbooks don't have the same priorities.

Managing my money:
Speaking of budgets, Future-Making Serious Games has an interesting story about a new educational game used to help teens manage their money, learn budgeting, and other financial skills. As someone who's taught money management to 7th and 8th graders, a game to do this would be a welcomed resource. Granted there are many games that apply economic issues, but this is a great use of teaching a process through gaming.