Gaming is a serious issue in education today! Our generation and beyond lives in a gaming world. As educators we are going to have to cater to this game atmosphere if we want to survive! Students are being challenged every day with video games, whether we see it that way or not. There was an article we read (I believe earlier in this class) about gaming. I've looked for it and just can't figure out where it came from, BUT I remember reading it out loud to my husband. It discussed how many people consider gaming an addiction. What about people who love to read, do we call that an addiction? The word addiction becomes negative when paired with video games. However, in the current generation of students that is how they are interacting with their world. They are meeting people all over the world, challenging each other, and creating masterpieces. I will admit my husband is a "serious gamer" on the XBOX and it drives me crazy, but he has shared some pretty cool games that require you to think outside the box and be creative!
In a past class we looked at this site, it has several tools to use in the classroom. I chose to research the creativity section and found much of it to be games. One of my favorite sites was the Invention at Play, the section that I think is really neat is Tinker Ball. This game could be used when talking about basic elements of physics. What I like about this section of games is they are not just remedial questions. These are sites that encourage creativity and thinking. Students get bored with just repetitive questions, even if there is a "little" game to go along with the question.
In my opinion, it is not worth it to spend my personal money on games that just spit out questions, IXL (you can use this site free for a limited time). There are plenty of free games available through PBS , funbrain, gameaquarium, and sites like BBC. However, I would be willing to spend money on Zondle's Phonics portion of the site. From the demo it sounds like kids follow a mission and work their way through different levels of phonics, while also saving the world :) Another site I am looking into using this year is ABC Mouse, which I found through a colleague in another class. It is free for teachers and you can set up a class account. Serious gaming does not have to be expensive if you look in the right places!