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Video Games as an Educational Tool
Video games get a bum rap. Much too often, they are blamed for making kids violent, giving them short attention spans in school, depicting an unrealistic view of the world, or just for being a complete waste of time. But I beg to differ. Many video games can be quite beneficial. I can’t claim all are – there are far too many games Pokemon and Mortal Kombat for that. But others can teach both children and adults valuable lessons that include strategy, observation, logic, problem solving, history, and geography. Will Wright (creator of Sim City and The Sims) recently wrote an article pertaining to the subject of the benefits of video games that can be found here. Wright deals more with the abstracts of video games, how their very nature can enhance the user. For this article, I’m more interested in looking at how the actual content of a video game can be valuable.
Not even the most strenuous detractors of this form of entertainment can deny that history and geography can be learned by playing video games. Oregon Trail immediately comes to mind for anyone who grew up in the ‘90’s because it used by a large number of schools and did a fantastic job of teaching about the migration to the West. But any period piece is going to end up teaching history on some level, whether the user wants to learn it or not. For example, take the Total War series, which includes Rome: Total War and Medieval 2: Total War, both favorites of mine. The player begins as a small nation or collection of city states, whether it is Rome, Britain, or Egypt, progresses through the years, and expands their empire. After spending many hours with Rome: Total War and Medieval 2: Total War, I know Europe like the back of my hand. Ancient Europe, at least. I know where the mountain ranges are, which forests my army will have to march around, the small villages ruled by rebels, and the large cities with insurmountable castles (at least until my trebuchets, the medieval siege weapon of choice, are built). The player must also handle the invasion of the Mongols, the outbreak of the bubonic plague, and adapt to the Gunpowder age. Religion is also a major component of Medieval 2: Total War and the player quickly learns that the Orthodox Byzantines are not the same as the Catholic countries of Western Europe.
The Total War series is not alone in this kind of history lesson. The Civilization games are also quite effective. One aspect of the game is building “wonders”, monuments from history that improve your empire. The available wonders range from the Statue of Liberty and the United Nations Building to Angkor Watt and the Pyramids. Sid Meier’s Pirates! also does an admirable job in teaching the user history and geography. Instead of Europe, the player is in the Caribbean as a pirate captain and not only will the player quickly learn each tiny island and what colonizing empire controls that island but they will even come to know which direction to sail in order to pick up the best tailwinds.
History and geography do not have to be the only useful thing found in a video game. Real-time strategy games have a strong foundation with numbers. The player must quickly learn to manage resources like food and wood, understand how much it will cost to build a building or train an army, and know which units counter which (for instance, do not charge your cavalry into a wall of pike men). As the name states, this genre takes a lot of strategy. A young child, with the benefit of playing games like Age of Empires and Warcraft, is bound to at least become more confident with numbers, if not somewhat proficient. The child also learns problem solving skills, a tool that is essential not only for nearly all video games but for life itself.
These examples make up just the tip of the iceberg of what video games can teach us. Flight simulators are required for Air Force pilots before they ever fly and there are various other simulations used to teach soldiers, including how to drive a tank. Admittedly, these are not the same games available to the public but there is no reason the technology that helps to win wars cannot be just as beneficial for the everyday video game player. I believe we have yet to see the true, long-term impact of video games on society. The 2-D games of the ‘80’s are like apples and oranges to the current level of technology found in games, a level that increases every year. Only now is the generation that grew up with modern day video games beginning to mature and it will be fascinating to see, once they become adults, if being raised on the likes of Halo and Starcraft has helped or hindered the development of the world’s children.