Ellen Makkas, MSc, PMP

Teaching Philosophy

 

The field of education continuously seeks solutions to transform and improve teaching and learning experiences, and that challenges educators to continually contend with how to apply strategies that will enable adult learners to process, retain, and apply information.

 

I have always enjoyed and played videos games, but more than this, they have influenced my thought process in a way that seeks to break boundaries, discover innovative strategies, and challenge the conventional way of educating adults.  So, what is it about games that have influenced how I teach and learn?  Games are interactive but most important for me is their ability to encourage us to seek solutions without the fear of failing and inspires us to try again.  And with a well-designed game, the result is an unconscious effort to do so naturally!

 

I can recall many times where I had played a game and lost.  Did I quit?  No!  In fact, without realizing it I had considered a variety of different actions and strategies on how I could approach my next move to accomplish my goal.  Without the conventional feeling of what is traditionally associated with failure, I had instead sought out and learned new information, and had applied it in a different way.  This is what makes games a powerful medium for teaching and learning-- not the act of interactivity, but it is being able to accept your failure as a challenge to do better. 

 

Games allow us to learn from the mistakes we make without repercussion which encourage improved problem-solving abilities.  They also provide an outlet to use critical thinking that enables us to attempt new approaches and strategies so to improve in order to reach a successful outcome.

 

My passion for games and my assessment of their impact on how people learn and improve turned out to be the most important influence in the direction of being in the field of educating adults.  I relish in the satisfaction of being able to educate, guide, and consult with others to empower their learning experiences. 

 

I am goal-oriented and enjoy the gratification of helping others succeed.  Games consist of tangible components that can be utilized to improve and diversify adult education teaching and learning, and they very well may be the quintessential link that is conducive to the efforts of achieving successful learner outcomes.

 

The art of instruction is a dynamic process that changes with each new classroom of adult learners, and embracing the concepts applied in games adds a new dynamic to creating innovative teaching and learning experiences.  There is an increasingly diverse demographic of learners, and to improve teaching and learning efforts, I have belief in the Constructivism Learning theory which places importance on the learner, and their ability to add prior knowledge while incorporating personal experiences to improve and gain information.  “The theories presented are anchored in practice, in the empirical research from which they derive and in the practical applications to which they can be put” (Bruner, 1974).  Constructivism emphasizes the hands-on approach of learning, and with the combination of game components, enables learners to improve their knowledge by recognition of their limitations, and the unconscious effort to improve.

The utilization of games as the foundational framework of an interactive learning environment coincides with the hands-on application of knowledge, discovery, and problem-solving concepts of the constructivism learning theory.  For example, in my Serious Games course, a final assignment is a research paper that reflects a game designed for an educational, informative, or training purpose completed through a series of milestones.  However, the application of the research being conducted can be executed in a series of different ways and not just as a traditional research paper.  One semester, students elected to deliver their research information in the form of a board game; another semester as a live simulation where the entire class got involved instead of merely presenting the research content followed by a question and answer session, and what a fantastic display of adult learners taking control of their education!

 

To improve the teaching and learning experience, I follow the Integrative Education Model.  Palmer and Zajonc (2010) explain that "integrative education at its best will always be an adventuresome, exploratory, and discovery-oriented form of learning that will never accommodate itself to the foregone conclusions and predictable outcomes on which standardized tests are built" (p. 39).  I believe as a foundational framework, games encompass the concepts of interactivity, discovery, adventure, problem-solving, self-improvement, and critical thinking that can supply innovative approaches for both teaching and learning experiences.