ATTITUDINAL SHIFT: Just on the heels of last week's tweet wrap-up on games and learning in the classroom, the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop has released "Teacher Attitudes about Digital Games in the Classroom," a survey of 505 teachers' use of gaming. Findings were encouraging with regards to adoption: 50% of teachers reported using games in the classroom at least twice a week, while 70% of respondents reported "that lower-performing students engage more with subject content with use of digital games." Somewhat discouraging, however, were teachers reporting cost as the largest barrier to using games in the classroom, followed by lack of access and resources and too much emphasis on standardized testing. This last barrier was a major point of contention at both NSVF and SIIA conferences--particularly from both developer and consumer sides pushing for higher quality edugames.
