Podcast on Marc Prensky's Book "Don't Bother Me Mom- I'm Learning!"

Intro
Hello everyone, my name is Kelly Ross and for today’s podcast I will be discussing Mark Prensky’s book “Don’t bother me mom I’m learning”. This book is a guide for parents who are concerned about their children playing video games. Prensky supports the use of video games in schools and even claims that students learn more from their video games than their teachers.

About the Author
Born on March 14, 1946, Marc Prensky is an American writer and speaker on education. He has degrees from Oberlin (1966), Yale (1968) and the Harvard Business school (1980). Prensky has taught every level of school from elementary to college and is a designer of learning games. He is especially well known as an expert in the use of games in education. Prensky is also the author of two other books, “Digital Game Based Learning” and “Digital Natives: Partner for Real Learning” as well as over 60 education articles. He currently lives in New York with his wife, Rie and his 6 year old son, Sky. (For more information on Marc Prensky you can view his website and bio here)

Content
Presnky’s book is split into five sections. I will briefly discuss each section but I would recommend reading the book your self for a more detailed understanding and examples pertaining to each of the sections.

The first section addresses the fears that many parents share about video games. Many people think that video games take up time that should be spent “learning” and to many parents the idea of using video games in school is absurd. The truth is that negative opinions about computer and video games tend to come from people who don't play them.

There’s no denying that children want to play video games. Their intrinsic motivation to play them is a powerful tool that should be utilized in the classroom. Prensky claims that kids learn more positive, useful things for their future from their video games than they learn in school. This is a bold statement indeed but it really comes from the fact that it’s how the video games are used that really matters.

In his second section Prensky discusses how children today are Natives to our digital world and the rest of us, immigrants. It is the immigrant’s digital “accents” that separate them from the natives and indeed some accents are stronger than others. Calling someone to let them know you sent them e-mail or printing out a document to edit it would be examples of digital accents.

The third section of Prensky’s book is about the different types of computer and video games and what students are really learning from them. Games designed to be complex and stimulating offer students opportunities to develop their 21st century skills like such as collaborative problem solving, multitasking, and networking. This section also give many examples of successful people who grew up playing video games and how important they were to their success.

The fourth section provides examples of case studies that show how students are learning challenging subjects, like economics, from games. One child that Prensky describes, Tyler, develops an understanding of the supply chain, management, and the division of labor through the use of the virtual world Runescape. Tyler experiences many of the same decisions making challenges and emotions of a real world company executive, all before he turns 11.

This section also has a lot of information regarding using video games to support the physical and emotional health of children. Using games to educate students about heath issues, such as disease prevention and control, has been proven to work. One study showed that “Kids with chronic conditions who played the disease management games at home for 6 months reduced their urgent care by as much as 77 percent” (2011, Kindle Location 2119)

Prensky’s final section of the book provides a plethora of ways to utilize games for educational purposes. These methods support the beliefs that there’s a game for everyone to enjoy somewhere out there and that just because a game is labeled educational doesn’t mean it is, and just because it’s not labeled educational, doesn’t mean it isn’t. Prensky also stresses that parents can become more involved in their children’s lives if they support them and try what their children love out for themselves.

Critique
I believe that Prensky’s book was very easy to read. His overall organization was well thought out and I feel he brought up many important points about the value that video games have to education.

I particularly enjoyed Prenky’s section on Digital Native and Digital Immigrants as this definitely helps define the divide that has occurred between our current generations in regards to technology. I feel that if more people would embrace the fact that they were immigrants, trying to survive in a world that is rapidly filling up with natives, more work could be done to improve their “accents”.

Although I enjoyed reading Prensky’s book and learned a lot, especially in regard to how to motivate and utilize video games in education, there is little support for his many assertions. He frequently discusses a future point in the book where he will “prove” a piece of information but I was never completely satisfied with hard evidence or empirical research supporting his claims. For this reason I have decided to rate Marc Prensky’s book “Don’t bother me mom, I’m learning” with 3 ½ stars.

Thank you for listening to my podcast.

Prensky, Marc (2011). Don't bother me mom-i'm learning. Paragon House. Kindle Edition.