Positive Impact Games SIG
A discussion and exploration of games leading to positive social change.

Books

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Grand Theft Childhood: The Surprising Truth About Violent Video Games and What Parents Can Do

Kutner and Olson, the husband-wife team who founded the Harvard Medical School Center for Mental Health and Media, wanted to know if video games are, as commonly argued, responsible for a rise in social violence. The book is intended to unmask some popular misconceptions while revealing what they found through their research.

Got Game: How the Gamer Generation Is Reshaping Business Forever

Those who are looking for a contrarian view of video games will find it in these pages. While many parents fret about their children’s minds turning to goo as they squander hour after hour absorbed in electronic diversion, the authors argue that gamers glean valuable knowledge from their pastime and that they’re poised to use that knowledge to transform the workplace.

Good Video Games and Good Learning

Good Video Games and Good Learning is packed with deep insight about games and learning. If you are creating games or studying them, if you are using games to educate or just want a sneak peek at the future of learning, then you must read this book. Gee doesn t focus on educational games, he shows how any good game is a context for learning–and conversely, what educators can learn from games.

Reset: Changing the Way We Look at Video Games

The book is about the positive potential of video games, and how we, as designers, can change our perspective to achieve games that are at the same time well designed (and of course loads of fun) and able to have a positive impact on players through various means.

The Kids are Alright: How the Gamer Generation is Changing the Workplace

Those who are looking for a contrarian view of video games will find it in these pages. While many parents fret about their children’s minds turning to goo as they squander hour after hour absorbed in electronic diversion, the authors argue that gamers glean valuable knowledge from their pastime and that they’re poised to use that knowledge to transform the workplace.

Killing Monsters: Our Children’s Need For Fantasy, Heroism, and Make-Believe Violence

Violent entertainment is good for kids, and demonizing it can do great harm to their emotional development, claims Jones (Honey, I’m Home!) in this provocative and groundbreaking work. Drawing on his experience as a parent and as a creator of children’s cartoons, as well as interviews with dozens of psychologists and educators, Jones forcefully argues that violent video games, movies, music and comics provide a safe fantasy world within which children learn to become familiar with and control the frightening emotions of anger, violence and sexuality.

Why Video Games Are Good for Your Soul: Pleasure and Learning

Why Video Games are Good for Your Soul is about pleasure and learning. Good video games allow people to create their own ‘music’, to compose a symphony from their own actions, decisions, movements, and feelings. They allow people to become ‘pros’, to feel and act like an expert soldier, city planner, world builder, thief, tough guy, wizard and a myriad of other things. They allow people to create order out of complexity, to gain and feel mastery, and to create new autobiographies, careers and histories.

What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy.
James Paul Gee begins his classic book with “I want to talk about video games&mdashyes, even violent video games&mdashand say some positive things about them.” With this simple but explosive statement, one of America`s most well-respected educators looks seriously at the good that can come from playing video games.
Simulations and the Future of Learning: An Innovative (and Perhaps Revolutionary) Approach to e-Learning

Simulations and the Future of Learning offers trainers and educators the information and perspective they need to understand, design, build, and deploy computer simulations for this generation. Looking back on his recent first-hand experience as lead designer for an advanced leadership development simulation, author Clark Aldrich has created a detailed case study of the creation and deployment of an e-learning simulation that had the development cycle of a modern computer game.

Changing the Game: How Video Games Are Transforming the Future of Business

Changing the Game reveals how leading-edge organizations are using video games to reach new customers more cost-effectively; to build brands; to recruit, develop, and retain great employees; to drive more effective experimentation and innovation; to supercharge productivity…in short, to make it fun to do business. This book is packed with case studies, best practices, and pitfalls to avoid. It is essential reading for any forward-thinking executive, marketer, strategist, and entrepreneur, as well as anyone interested in video games in general.

Exodus to the Virtual World: How Online Fun Is Changing Reality

Virtual worlds have exploded out of online game culture and now capture the attention of millions of ordinary people: husbands, wives, fathers, mothers, workers, retirees. Devoting dozens of hours each week to massively multiplayer virtual reality environments (like World of Warcraft and Second Life ), these millions are the start of an exodus into the refuge of fantasy, where they experience life under a new social, political, and economic order built around fun . Given the choice between a fantasy world and the real world, how many of us would choose reality? Exodus to the Virtual World explains the growing migration into virtual reality, and how it will change the way we live–both in fantasy worlds and in the real one.

Augmented Learning: Research and Design of Mobile Educational Games

New technology has brought with it new tools for learning, and research has shown that the educational potential of video games resonates with scholars, teachers, and students alike. In Augmented Learning, Eric Klopfer describes the largely untapped potential of mobile learning games—games played on such handheld devices as cell phones, Game Boys, and Sony PSPs—to make a substantial impact on learning. Examining mobile games from both educational and gaming perspectives, Klopfer argues that the strengths of the mobile platform—its portability, context sensitivity, connectivity, and ubiquity—make it ideal for learning games in elementary, secondary, university, and lifelong education.

Ethics and Game Design: Teaching Values through Play

This is the first book in its field to challenge scholars and researchers to answer questions such as: How can game design be improved to foster ethical thinking and discourse? What are the theories and methodologies that will help us understand, model, and assess ethical thinking in games? How do we use games in classrooms and informal educational settings to support moral development? This distinguished publication approaches such questions from a multidisciplinary perspective with the ultimate goal of inspiring further interdisciplinary dialogue and research in order to continue building the ethics and games community.

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