Digital Badge #E

Digital games for learning are computer and web-based games that are operated to teach students academically. I like the idea of teachers using digital games as a tool for learning because they help motivate and engage students more. Digital learning games are also good for students who aren’t interested in learning. The book mentions that digital games have the potential to improve students’ attitudes about learning even difficult subjects (Maloy, 171). A digital game that I was familiar with was freerice. I remember playing that game in our technology class and found it very interesting. I like this game because it asks questions about different subjects and for every correct answer ten grains of rice would be donated. It made me want to get every answer correct just for the donation. I think that this would be a good digital game to use to study for tests. I used flipquiz to show my own example of how digital learning games can be used.

Higher-order thinking and lower-order thinking are different forms of thinking that came from Bloom’s taxonomy; a system used for classifying thinking skills. Lower-order thinking focuses on memorizing and reproducing knowledge with little or no reflection of problem-solving (Maloy, 328). While higher-order thinking focuses on processing information and solving problems in ways that promote new meanings and understandings (Maloy, 327). An example that they used in the book for lower-order thinking was by having students memorize spelling words. To encourage the higher-order thinking the teacher would have students write a poem or create a dialogue for a skit using those spelling words (163). I like the idea of these two concepts because they push students to think more. I also think that starting with lower-order thinking, and progressing to higher-order thinking benefits those students who have a hard time learning. I used storybird to create an example story of what a student might do using higher-order thinking with their spelling words.

references:  Maloy, R. W. (2014). Transforming learning with new technologies (2nd ed.). Boston: Pearson.