Building lesson plans around a gaming environment creates effective learning

Gotta Catch 'Em All is the slogan for Pokémon, the most popular video game franchise of the last 20 years. In the Pokémon game series, players act as "trainers" who go on journeys to collect fictional creatures called Pokémon. As they catch Pokémon, they are mentored by wise scientists and must pay attention to all the bits of information that are presented along the way and use these facts to draw connections and make decisions. In our own journey of capturing students' attention and shaping their understanding of information, using Pokémon in the classroom can be a valuable tool for teaching lessons across the curriculum.

In a shift toward project-based lessons (or project-based learning), lessons formulated by educators are designed around students learning by doing. School librarians/media specialists have the unique ability to be able to use a variety of new media in lessons, making the implementation of project-based learning easier. Students are playing video games at home in record numbers, and studies such as the Kaiser Family Foundation's "Generation M2: Media in the Lives of 8- to 18-Year-Olds" (kff.org/entmedia/8010.cfm) reveal that this trend is most true for our youngest students. Librarians and teachers must embrace the fact that video games offer students valuable literacy activities and important life skills. Harnessing these activities and putting them to use in libraries and classrooms will help to shape how we view education and human information behavior.

Games as teaching tools

But let's be honest. The idea of using video games as teaching tools still has stigma attached to it. While some administrators and parents may feel uncomfortable around this new media, there is no question that video gaming can be implemented in schools and libraries. But how can librarians bring gaming into classrooms in a meaningful way? This is where Pokémon fits in.

Pokémon is a hugely popular intellectual property (IP) that had its start as a video game IP in 1997. While many video game IPs have made their way into pop culture (Pac-Man and Super Mario are recognized even by those who have never played a video game), Pokémon has been especially influential. It has branched out successfully to other media such as books, cartoons, card games, and toys. The game Pokémon Platinum has sold over 20 million copies since 2007, and is being played by gamers from kindergarten to college. This overarching popularity means that connecting Pokémon to classroom lessons will create an immediate familiarity for students.

How do we teach the Pokémon generation? If we recognize that students connect to lessons when a familiarity is established, then the use of any media form in class is equally valid. The goal of education is learning, and if gaming can help students learn more effectively, why aren't we doing it already? Should librarians become more familiar with the medium and start gaming at home? Maybe. We are avid readers, partially because our job deals so heavily with books. How can we bring gaming to libraries and classrooms if we are not gaming? Librarians can't read every book, but are familiar with books as media. Similarly, we can't play every game, but we should be aware of how information is used in the medium of gaming. This is not so difficult to achieve. If you are already playing "Farmville" on Facebook, you are on your way to being a gamer!

Pokédex

Some librarians may not feel comfortable implementing a full-scale classroom lesson using Pokémon. That's fine—begin by starting small. If you are teaching your students about your library's OPAC (Open Public Library Catalog), you can make an immediate connection with them by saying that an OPAC is a library's Pokédex (Pokémon Indexer, a database of Pokémon and Pokémon statistics). Bulbapedia, the Internet's largest informational resource on Pokémon (with over 16,000 articles on the subject), uses the words "information" and "database" to describe the Pokédex. Wikipedia describes the Pokédex as a "device designed to catalog and provide information" and a "portable reference tool." In fact, kids are playing games in which they are acting like librarians. If they understand that librarians can point to and provide information like a Pokédex does, we can turn a whole generation of students on to the value of librarians and librarianship.

The word Pokédex is a portmanteau of the words Pokémon and index; students can understand the "library space" as more than a room full of books if they think of the OPAC as a Pokédexesque index and librarians as similar to the expert professors in the Pokémon game. Additional lessons can then be tailored around the limitations of digital sources (like a Pokédex) and how librarians can provide the next step in the students' information journey. Both the strengths and limitations of the Pokédex mirror those of the digital indexes librarians use.

Classroom Applications

In all Pokémon games, players control a character who catches and raises fictional creatures that are collectively called Pokémon and are amalgamations of real-world animals. The world in which you explore and catch these Pokémon reflects our real world in many ways, which is why it is easy to relate Pokémon to so many classroom applications.

Pokémon's creator, biology enthusiast Satoshi Tajiri, has said that the games are based on his own experiences collecting and cataloging insects as a child. Pokémon players have become a generation of experts in the field of Pokémon biology. If you are looking to test the waters and try out a Pokémon lesson in your classroom, here's some biology-themed lesson ideas.

Compare species of Pokémon to real-world animal species. Using textbooks, Internet sources, encyclopedias, library databases, game guides, wikis, television programs, and your own play experience, research both the Pokémon species and the real-world animal species that you feel the Pokémon is based on. Write a paper comparing the similarities of the two. Here are some questions that should be answered in the paper:

• Is your Pokémon's name similar to your real-world animal's name; does it elude to the Latin name or the English name of that animal?
• How does your Pokémon's behavior reflect the behavior of the real animal?
• What unrealistic behavior does your Pokémon exhibit?
• Imagine that your Pokémon was a real animal. Based on your research, do you think it would survive in nature? Who would be its predators and its prey? If it is an herbivore, is there sufficient food? Would it be doomed to extinction or would it threaten other life?
• If your Pokémon was real, how would it affect the ecosystem that your real animal lives in?
• Imagine that your real animal is a Pokémon. How would it survive in any of the Pokémon regions?
• Based on your research, is your Pokémon or your real animal better equipped to survive in nature?

While Pokémon naturally connects with science lessons, making it relevant to other subject areas is easy. Mathematics teachers for advanced grades can ask students to do studies on the use of numbers in the game. Elementary grades can use specific examples in lessons, such as "A level 6 Abra evolves at level 16. How many more levels does the Abra need to evolve?" (The answer is 10). Elementary English classes can compare the differences between Pokémon books and video games (a study in storytelling across different forms of media). Specific lessons, such as map skills or intercultural relations, are all important themes students deal with in Pokémon. Teachers can also bring students into the lesson planning process by asking them what they have learned from Pokémon and what the class as a whole can learn.

Pokémon as a classroom tool is only the beginning of using games to teach. Games have a plot, character development, thematic elements, and interactive narrative devices—the same terms used to describe books. Games are forging new ground in terms of user collaboration. For example, Sony's new marketing campaign for the PS3 includes a humorous look at the leadership qualities needed to succeed in the 256-player online game MAG.

Librarians are best at collaboration and sharing information—and the Pokémon generation is doing the same thing in relation to video game media. The information and education communities can't afford to exclude gaming from the learning process. Through the efforts of forward-thinking leaders in the field, gaming in the classroom will become more relevant and effective.