With
the launch of the Xbox Kinect in 2010, Microsoft sought to assert its position
in the console gaming market. With a history of bringing innovative products to
market, the Xbox Kinect would serve to highlight Microsoft’s continued
leadership in the gaming industry. What many may not have initially realized
was that in addition to revolutionizing gesture-based gaming, the Kinect has
the potential to transform student engagement and classroom learning.
With
support from the Microsoft Partners in
Learning Network, educators in Ontario have had the opportunity to
investigate the benefits and challenges of using the Xbox Kinect to enhance
student engagement and support 21st century teaching and learning. In addition
to the hundreds of educators that have had the opportunity to participate in a
variety of Kinect in the Classroom and Gamification of Learning workshops
delivered by Brock University, Teacher Candidates, a number of Ontario educators
were provided with access to an Xbox Kinect and a variety of games so that they
could explore ways to integrate the Kinect into their classroom practice.
Following
participation in a Gamification of Learning workshop that demonstrated ways to
use the Kinect to support classroom instruction, educators were asked to
describe what they considered to be the benefits and challenges to using the
Kinect in the classroom. The 82 comments that were captured noted some common
themes (full listing of comments). The key benefits to using the
Kinect in the classroom were the ability to engage students, the interactive
nature of the learning activities, and the opportunity to have students
participate in physical activity. The greatest challenges to using this gaming
system in the classroom were identified as the limited opportunities for large group
or whole-class participation, the cost of acquiring the game system, and a lack
of curricular focus.
Key Benefits
The participants
of the Kinect in the Classroom workshop identified student engagement as one
the key benefits to using the Kinect. This finding supports the research
literature that indicates that gaming in the classroom can have a positive
impact on student engagement. A meta-analysis of over 300 research articles
related to gaming for education found that playing video games as part of the
classroom learning often resulted in increased levels of student engagement
(Young et al., 2012). Additional research has also noted that Kinect-based
learning activities support multiple physical engagement patterns, and allows
students to use a larger spectrum of the their multiple intelligences (Hsu,
2010). Consequently, the Kinect’s success in engaging student may be a
consequence of its ability to simultaneously address multiple intelligences, by
taping into the visual, auditory and kinesthetic abilities of students (Hsu,
2010).
In
contrast to teacher-directed lessons where students can remain inactive and
passive for significant periods of time, learning opportunities that stress
student interactivity have been identified as contributing to successful
teaching and learning (Angotti & Bayo 2012; Hsu, 2010). Being able to
physically interact with educational content can make learning some concepts
easier for the 15% of students that are kinesthetic learners (Hsu, 2010). Thus,
it is not surprising that a number of the Kinect in the Classroom responses
identified the interactive nature of the Kinect as being one of its key
benefits.
A
number of the respondents noted that they considered the ability to use the
Kinect to get students physically active and support the provincial mandate of
daily physical activity (DPA) as being one of the benefits of using the Kinect
in the classroom.
Key Challenges
A
large number of the responses noted that they considered the limited
opportunities for large group or whole-class participation when using the
Kinect to being a challenge to using this resource in the classroom. A repeated
theme noted in the responses was that educators had concerns about only a few
students being able to use the Kinect system, while the majority of the class
would be left to watch. While it is understandable that teachers would want to
ensure that all students are engaged, what they may not have considered is that
every student does not need to have their individual gestures captured by the Kinect
camera for them to be actively engaged in game play. A number of the educators
that had the opportunity to utilize the Kinect system in their classrooms
reported that even though a student’s gestures were not captured on the screen,
many
students were happy to play alongside the “active” players, provide
instructions to the players or study the active players as a means to learn
from their actions and improve their chances of success when it was their turn.
Although
there are significant space limitations as to how many students can be moving
their limbs while mimicking game play, educators have noted that moving the
Kinect system to the gymnasium and using a LCD projector will enable large
numbers of students to participate simultaneously. One educator noted that were
able to have the entire school, over 200 students, participate in a Kinect
dance game as part of a school-wide rainy day DPA initiative.
It
is interesting to note that a number of educators considered the cost of the
Kinect system as being a concern, as the price of acquiring the gaming console
was not part of any of the workshop presentations. Regardless, the Xbox
Kinect bundle, which includes the Kinect Adventures game, can be acquired
for $300. For anyone that may already have an Xbox 360, the Kinect
camera and Kinect Adventures game can be purchased for less that $120.
While spending $300 to play games in the classroom may seem like a frivolous
purchase, it is important to acknowledge that the Xbox Kinect can also be used
to as DVD player, media (photos, music and video) storage system, Internet
browser, and video conferencing system with the addition of the Skype app.
To
alleviate the financial challenges to using the Kinect in the classroom, a
number of teachers in the Niagara, Hamilton, London Catholic, Toronto and
Toronto Catholic school districts have benefitted from the opportunity to
borrow an Xbox
Kinect system via a partnership between the Teacher Education Department at
Brock University and Microsoft Canada. The loan program increased the number of
educators that have had an opportunity to experiment with Kinect in the
classroom and find innovative ways to use the gaming system to support the
Ontario curriculum.
Despite
the number of responses that indicated a concern about a lack of curricular
connection, educators that have had an opportunity to participate in the Kinect
loan program report that they have found a number of interesting ways to use
the gaming system to support specific learning expectations in variety of subject
areas.
By
far, the easiest way to integrate the Kinect into the classroom is to use active
games such as Dance
Central, Just
Dance, Just
Dance Kids, Kinect
Sports, and Your
Shape: Fitness Evolved to address the Ontario Ministry of Education’s daily physical activity
(DPA) requirement. Moving beyond the
provincial DPA requirement, the next most obvious opportunity to integrate the
Kinect into the classroom is to use the Body
& Brain Connection game as part math class. This game provides students
with an engaging way to develop their mathematical reasoning while supporting
kinesthetic learning. Educators also noted that compiling the results from a
number of the sporting activities that are part of Kinect Sports game, allowed
students to engage in data management as they analyzed and documented the game results.
Adjusting the angle of ones limbs, changing the force applied or varying timing
of movements and then calculating the changes in gaming performance can also
provide students with an opportunity to address some of the ministry’s geometry
and science expectations.
Some
of most innovative ways to integrate the Kinect into the classroom came from
educators using the non-fitness games to address the language arts curriculum.
Procedural writing is an expectation that is addressed at all elementary grade
levels. Consequently, requiring students to write out the steps or procedures
to successfully complete any Kinect game or activity challenges them to be
clear and precise in their written directions. Evaluating the accuracy of the
directions can be completed by having another student implement the written
directions to determine if they will result in successful completion of the
game.
Oral
communication is also a curriculum area that is address at all elementary
levels. One innovative teacher noted that blindfolding a student, while another
student provide oral directions to complete the Kinect activity challenged
their students to be direct and concise when providing oral directions.
While
completing any Kinect partner game can challenge student communication and
interpersonal skills, teachers in the London
Catholic board have reported great success is having students with Autism
engage in Kinect partnered game play to develop the communication skills of
their special needs students.
These
example of using the Kinect to address oral or written communication
expectations highlights the innovative ways that the Kinect can be integrated
into the classroom to support the Ontario curriculum expectations. These findings pleasantly contradict
concerns related to a lack of curricular focus. The ability to use the Kinect
in the classroom to support student learning is limited only by imagination of
educators as they seek innovative ways to engage students and support learning.
References
Angotti, R., & Bayo, I. (2012). Making Kinections : Using video game technology to teach math. Prato CIRN Community Informatics Conference (pp. 1–5).
Hsu, H. J. (2011). The Potential of
Kinect in Education. International
Journal of Information and Education Technology, 1(5), 365–370.
Young, M. F., Slota, S., Cutter, a. B., Jalette, G.,
Mullin, G., Lai, B., Simeoni, Z., et al. (2012). Our Princess Is in Another
Castle: A Review of Trends in Serious Gaming for Education. Review of Educational Research, 82(1), 61–89.
*PDF version of Kinect in the Classroom: Integrating Gesture-Based Gaming into the Ontario Classroom with charts and response comments
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