Gaming the System: Gaming and Relational Literacy
Video gaming is a kind of literacy, and one that has a proven effect on other kinds of literacies, such as cultural, technological, and media literacy as well as design thinking. As educators, it is important to understand what literacies or “reading practices” students are already bringing into the classroom in order to teach from a place that recognizes students’ strengths and supports their interests. This is particularly the case for many neurodivergent learners, especially those who are autistic and/or ADHD, for whom gaming often provides a valuable and accessible sphere of agency, engagement, achievement, and self-expression.
At the same time, a simple “gamification” approach to education risks instrumentalizing away the very things that make gaming so appealing. This is sometimes described as the “chocolate covered broccoli” effect. Worse, a gaming-as-unidirectional-intervention approach, which has been particularly prevalent in the medical discourse of the past several years, risks uncritically reinscribing stigmatizing, over-simplified, and outright manipulative practices (the medical or educational equivalent of Gacha games).
Instead, an engagement with game-based literacies should be based on the core relationality at the centre of education itself, involving an open-endedness and meaningful interactivity that allows for the development of a student’s sense of agency, engagement, achievement, and self-expression.
Presenter:
Dr. Ben Mitchell is a librarian, educator, and researcher with a background in the history of science and medicine. They have been a curator involved in the public history of mental health and neurodivergence and have delivered talks and programming on topics related to neurodiversity and information literacy at numerous conferences and events, including as an invited speaker at the Waterloo Public Library and as part of CAPAL’s Diversity & Equity Committee. They are also the organizer of the Neuro-GLAM-erous Discord server and annual conference for neurodivergent gallery, library, archives, and museum (GLAM) workers.
Cost: Free
Registration Link: https://forms.gle/YfU184wQWQqbtNXe9
This is part of the Maskwacis Cultural College Microlearning Series and is open to the public.
Contact Manisha Khetarpal by email mkhetarpal@mccedu.ca or call toll free: 1 866 585 3925