Video Games in the Classroom: Developing Digital Literacies

Abstract

Popular culture and the digital world are an important part of many children’s lives. Computer games, virtual worlds and social networking sites are seamlessly integrated into their everyday work, relationships and play. While the degree and nature of children’s involvement varies according to age, interest, opportunity and parental support, by the time they leave primary school, most students will have had significant engagement with popular culture, media and new technologies, including active first hand experience of digital culture and the online world. In Australia, the Australian Communications and Media Authority researched levels of engagement with digital culture and the online world. This study surveyed the media usage of young people between the ages of 8 and 17 in the year 2007 (ACMA 2008). It found that online engagement was an important part of children’s lives. In Australia at that time, the study found, boys and girls aged 8-11 spent an average of 30 minutes on the internet per day (p. 4). Between a quarter and a third of children aged 8-11 had a computer or game console in their bedroom (p. 7) and 24% of the 1000 children in this age group who participated in the survey played online gaming against other players (p. 12). Given the rapid rate of change, and the growing presence of technology in almost every aspect of our lives, it is highly likely that figures about children’s media usage in both countries have increased since then. All of these are good reasons for building digital literacies into the literacy and English curriculum, and for paying attention to the multimodal, digital texts that are part of contemporary children’s lives.