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Can online videogames be good for children? Lots of recent academic research suggests that YES – appropriately designed games that provide a safe and educational online experience can have an extremely positive impact on the children that play them.

The games and websites that MotivatEd create provide a trusted and constructive child experience – How do we achieve this? Simply by making them safe (always priority No.1), educational (of course!), fun, and sociable.

A responsibly designed educational game such as www.footee.com can:

• Provide a fun and social form of entertainment.
• Encourage teamwork and co-operation when played with others.
• Make kids feel comfortable with ever progressing technology and e-learning.
• Provide points of common interest and opportunities for safe socialising.
• Develop skills in reading, mathematics, science, geography, technology and problem-solving.
• Encourage participation in related offline activities, such as reading or sports.
• Improve hand-eye co-ordination and fine motor skills.

Professor Mark Griffiths, of Nottingham Trent University, has researched the psychological impact of computer games on children. In a recent BBC news article he shared some tips for parents on taking a sensible approach to child gaming:

• “Check the content of the gaming activity. Try and give children and adolescents games that are educational rather than violent. Parents usually have control over what their kids watch on television – gaming should be no different.”

• “Try to encourage gaming in groups rather than as a solitary activity. This will lead to children and adolescents talking and working together. Also remember that many online games are based on social activity and working together. Research has consistently shown that the main reason for playing online games is for the social element.”

• “Set limits on playing time. Tell children and adolescents that they can play for a couple of hours as a reward after they have done their homework or their chores – not before.”

• “Parents and guardians should always get their children to follow the recommendations by the game manufacturers (e.g. sit a suitable distance away from the screen, play games in a well-lit room, never have the screen at maximum brightness, and never engage in gaming when already feeling tired).”

It’s been an exciting couple of weeks here at MotivatEd. For several months we’ve been working closely with Chelsea FC to create their very own version of e-learning site Footee, and on Wednesday 7th December the launch took place, celebrating and announcing its arrival on the bridgekids.chelseafc.com junior web zone.

The Chelsea-themed version of Footee is packed with all the standard Footee goodies, lesson plans, activity sheets, and of course, a plethora of National Curriculum- linked educational games. The exceptionally exciting thing about this particular launch though is that for the first time we are leveraging the appeal of a Champions League level team to engage educationally with children – a team that gets literally millions of visitors to its website on a weekly basis.

Throughout the development process we have even had star Chelsea players try out footee, leading amazing young player Juan Mata to say, “I think it’s an excellent website. The games, matches, and adventures are great fun, and it’s exciting to know that they help our young fans to improve their maths, science, nutritional knowledge, and reading too. We have some of the finest young supporters in the league at Chelsea and it’s good to know that their loyalty to the club, and passion for football, can help them to get smarter through playing Footee.”

Chelsea is amongst the first of many world class teams to adopt the Footee experience, stay tuned for news of the next mega club Footee launch, coming very soon!

Tags: E-Learning, educational games, football games online, Lesson plans, primary games

A tournament as prestigious and expansive as the 2011 Rugby World Cup is obviously a major sporting event. But did you know that aside from the obvious frenetic sports and commercial activity going on in New Zealand at the moment, there are also Rugby World Cup related e-learning projects aimed at inspiring academic learning in school children?

We have been working closely with two prestigious UK rugby organisations to create interactive learning resources that explore the tournament (and rugby in general) in relationship to the national curriculum. The materials (including teacher lesson plans)encourage children to explore various aspects of the 2011 Rugby World Cup, including planning, teamwork, geography, statistics, citizenship, reading skills, and the mathematical mechanics of a rugby match. Our belief is that contextualising these topics in such a colourful and exciting real-world sporting setting helps to make them seem more “alive”and less theoretical – raising pupil interest and creating a vibrant learning experience.

The kinds of activities we have helped to create include a mythical “future host nation” World Cup bid – encouraging pupils to research the bidding process, detail their findings – and create their own bid presentation to a panel of judges.  Other activities focus on topics such as numeracy and the importance of angles in relationship to rugby passing and kicking. The resources also features a number of interactive online activities that reinforce student learning – whilst engaging strongly with them through their love of videogames.

If you’re interested in taking a look at the downloadable activity sheets, lesson plans, and educational games resources, they are completely free, and can be found at the www.rugbeeground.com site we have co-created. There are extensive resources for both pupils and teachers. Let me know what you think of them!

In October, a big additional educational games zone called Rugbee – themed around a major UK rugby league – will go live on the site. I’ll explain how we developed Rugbee in my next posting, until then – happy e-learning!

Were you interested in sport as a kid?

I was, big time!

Frankly I was a little obsessed (in the same way that I am obsessed by E-Learning now!) and I am so glad that I was, because it enriched my childhood years massively. Fitness, adventure, competition, achievement, excitement, character building defeats, dreams of future glories – football, running, cricket and golf supplied them all in abundance.

Let’s face it; there is something magical and raw about the way a child perceives the world. And sport has never seemed quite as exhilarating for me since those heady days of playing in the park, or losing myself in the latest edition of Roy of The Rovers. I would have done pretty much anything to meet my football idol or to have been good enough to make it as a pro. In many respects, for several enjoyable years, sport was my life – other concerns were just passing distractions.

The reason for all of this dewy-eyed reminiscing will now become clear! There are several core things that have instinctive appeal to children and fire their imaginations, and sport always seems close to the top of that list (amongst music, dinosaurs, animals, videogames, films, etc.)

Why is this important? It’s because the appeal and passion is so great we can use sport to motivate positivity in other areas of a child’s life. In fact that is exactly what we do here at MotivatEd. We create a way of making maths, reading, and science interesting to young sports fans; it really is a simple as that! Developing E-learning primary educational games that are themed around professional sport but explore academic topics. Like I say, it is a simple concept, but it’s one that is profoundly effective. The bottom line is that sports-themed educational games really work at engaging with children. We know, in our research we’ve seen it happen, close up, thousands of times.

So, next time you see a child ecstatic at scoring a goal in the park or delirious with joy at his team winning an important match, think about the how that natural overflowing excitement and pleasure can be harnessed to make other parts of their life more fulfilling too, it’s an exciting idea isn’t it?

Tags: E-Learning, educational games

8 year old Johnny is sitting in class, and he’s bored, really bored.

Last night, for 45 minutes, he was a space marine commander in quadrant 5. First thing this morning he was texting his friend Jamie about Chelsea’s win over Newcastle United on Saturday. But now he’s just looking at a whiteboard filled with scribbled mathematical equations, flicking through a staid text book, and listening to a teacher admirably trying to make it sound interesting to all in attendance.

Make no mistake Johnny is a bright boy – but he is growing up in a high tech world – A world which brings theory to animated life all around him. If we could just get Johnny to see how relevant, creative and exciting maths is, he’d probably be a real talent – But Johnny has got football, smart phones and video games firmly on his mind instead.

Now, imagine a class session where the mathematical subject taught is brought to life by exiting e-Learning: animated sporting action – fizzing across the white board. An interactive cartoon world supported by comprehensive lesson plans and accessible to all pupils. Johnny knows that if he can just improve his grasp of the finer points of long division, he will be able to win the next round of action packed educational games he plays – be rewarded with virtual goodies, and help build an even better virtual football team for his excited class.

In this situation, suddenly Johnny is motivated to learn. And the great thing is that Johnny then realises that maths is actually quite fun after all (and he wants to learn more). It was just the education delivery method that had alienated him, not the subject itself.

Imagine no more. That’s exactly what we do here at MotivatEd. We create appealing virtual worlds that are packed with National Curriculum educational games, all of which are sports themed and are backed by comprehensive lesson plans. We make on-line environments packed with star professional teams and players. We work with and leverage the appeal of teams like Chelsea, Liverpool and Arsenal FC to get kids like Johnny to engage with numeracy, literacy, science and geography.

And do real kids, similar to mythical little Johnny, really need innovative e-Learning mediums such as www.footee.com to help them engage and learn? Well yes, in my view, many do. The world that children now inhabit has changed so much in the last 20 years, and education is struggling to keep apace with the cultural changes, especially in terms of technology usage. Many children appear to find the classroom dull, old-fashioned and uninspiring when compared to the world outside of school, and this must surely have a negative effect on their learning.

I’ll finish this posting with a few eye-opening 2011 stats which might be seen to back up the above argument for innovative e-Learning to a certain degree:

Nine percent of boys in England reach the age of 11 with, at best, the reading skills of an average seven-year-old. This figure equates to over 18,000 English boys with seriously substandard literacy. In some areas, such as Nottingham, Derby, Manchester, Rotherham and Telford the figure was closer to 15%.*

In response to these disturbing figures, Dylan William, professor at the Institute of Education, said:

“it could be very hard for children struggling with their reading to catch up and that it had never been more important to be able to read to a decent standard. Twenty years ago, you got a lot of information from television. Now it’s the internet – you have to be more literate.”

Child literacy statistics source: BBC Today Programme Jan 2011

Tags: E-Learning, education games, Lesson plans

And welcome to the very first posting on the brand new MotivatEd Ltd Blog!

My name is Dominic Cahalin and I work for Cambridge based e-learning company MotivatEd.

So who exactly are MotivatEd?

We are an e-Learning company that has a passionate mission to educate children using the medium of video games and sport. I’m not talking about teaching them about sport – rather we use the appeal of sport (combined with online gaming) to create fun games that teach children the core elements of the National Curriculum at Key Stage 2 – e.g. maths, Literacy, geography, science skills.

Our dream is to engage with sports and video game loving children (who might not be particularly interested in certain curriculum subjects) and show them that those subjects CAN be fun!

And who am I?

My background is varied – I was a videogames designer for Sony Computer Entertainment for 11 years, based in the West End of London. Since then I moved to Cambridge and have worked in various marketing and creative positions – all technology related. When I was working at Sony I was always fascinated by the huge potential of videogames as powerful learning medium, and I guess that is why I have ended up at MotivatEd.

My aim with this Blog is to explore the world of educational games and e-learning, with direct reference to the creation process of our educational games, websites, and materials (lesson plans, etc.)  To give you an insight into the philosophy and approach we have to e-leaning. And to give you a firsthand account of the challenges we face and the solutions we find.

Ultimately, my personal mission in writing this blog is to highlight the incredible potential of educational games, and to fully explain why I think they can positively transform the learning experience for many school children. Occasionally some of my colleagues will contribute posts too… giving their own unique perspective on the exciting world of educational games.

My next post will focus on why MotivatEd focuses on “Sports Themed” educational websites, how our websites work – and how we have built relationships with some of the world’s biggest sporting bodies and clubs, in our attempt to engage educationally with the largest amount of children possible.

Please do add comments! It would be great to hear your thoughts on the subjects I explore. The comment button is in the post summary text.

Tags: E-Learning, education games, Key stage 2, Lesson plans