I’ve been thinking lately that so much about our learning depends on context.  (The field practicum in social work is a perfect example of this.)

I imagine that early man, in fact, found the idea of teaching in a classroom (an actual space removed from their day to day activities) as a rather novel idea.  Perhaps classrooms were deemed a technological innovation of sorts!

Ironically, the classroom space today is held up by many as the ideal place for learning to occur.    But is it really ideal?

Gaming platforms offer many more advantages for learning than do traditional classroom environments. Learning in virtual worlds is experiential, and can include collaboration.
Students may find the virtual environment less threatening than a real-world practicum setting.   Environments might be tailored more to the needs of individual students.

I’m not saying that gaming is the preferred approach to teaching every imaginable subject.  I’m certainly not saying that it would replace the field practicum in social work.  But I have a growing list of topics that I think it would be well-suited for (and maybe better suited for).

i suspect that in the future gaming and other new technologies will lead to new discoveries about how people learn, and the effectiveness of more conventional approaches will be debated.  In the meantime, educators will need to keep an open mind about the possibilities.

After all, imagine if as a species we had never given the classroom a chance.