Educational Game Mechanic

[Frieda]

Originally Posted by Aesahaettr

Dartmouth is big on using the Rassias Method for language training, and I definitely saw a lot of payoff from it. Some more details on the method are here, but in short it's a dynamic exchange between instructor and students that breaks down inhibitions and fosters spontaneity and comfort with a language. One of my favorite parts of the Method is the reliance on verbalization; we learn language by speaking more easily than by reading.

It would be neat if we could bring that kind of method to a digital language tool, but I'm not sure it can be done...the dynamic interaction that the digital medium provides is different from that required by the Rassias method. Teleconferencing with a human instructor (apart from being impractical for many people) has too much lag for the spontaneous aspect, and even a good program is still far too impersonal.

personally, i have never been able to learn language focused on speech and conversation.. i'm best with association learning-- if i see an image of a tree, i immediately associate that with the words for tree in every language i know.. and i am unable to remember how to properly pronounce words if i do not know how they are written.

but that's personal, could fit the dyscalculia profile.. hey now i think about it--can we make a tool that teaches me math??

[Aesahaettr]

I'm still not sold on the language idea, to be honest. I'm sure we could come up with something pretty cool, and something is better than nothing. But language is a unique problem in that it's specifically a method of interaction between people. What I know about language tells me that no program could come close to the level of language instruction afforded by direct, spontaneous, uninhibited person-to-person interaction. For a digital environment, I think our time would be better spent on something else.