At the general school in Ciolpani, Ilfov county, secondary school students learn history in a completely new way. “Lesson “The natural environment and daily life in the Ancient East” is taught with the help of a video game. “Students, with the help of a console, discover the ancient city and have the task of observing the details in the game – the people, the city and the environment”, director Mariana Banu explained for “Adevărul”.
Around 350 students study at the school in Ciolpani. “They are very good children, of whom we are proud. We knew this initiative would receive positive feedback. Which is what happened, because the students learned to love history through the game”, confesses the teacher.
“Our story began two years ago when we signed up for this pilot project supported and financed by an NGO. We are talking about a new teaching technique, through which the students they are encouraged to give up rote learning. The game stimulates their imagination, logical thinking, memory”, continues the director. “We have three consoles. Depending on how the teacher thinks, depending on the lesson she has to teach in the class on a given day, if the situation demands it..the class can be supported by technology”, the teacher continues.
But, before introducing this new teaching method to the students, the teacher herself went through an initiation course: “These are not classic games, students don’t play like they do at home. These games are educational. Children learn by playing, they retain certain aspects, they judge, they think. And I do it with great pleasure. In 2022, a first meeting was held with the principals of the schools participating in this pilot project. Then there was a meeting between the principals and the teachers. We chose the history teacher to use this technique. Which he had to learn first”.
Students learn by playing
It is a practical and extremely useful game, explains director Banu: “One, two students are playing, the others are watching. And they accumulate all kinds of information that they might not otherwise memorize. They must be detectives. To watch how people dressed in antiquity, what customs they had, they were characters walking through a square. The children practically learned what products to sell in those days. Then, they found out how the buildings were built, what furniture existed in those times”.
Then the information received is discussed in class. There are free and extremely interesting discussions: “The game doesn’t last very long. It cannot occupy the entire hour. But it provides that information that is analyzed further. Questions are asked, answered, certain aspects are analysed, certain situations encountered in the game are commented on. It is an interactive history lesson, with the direct participation of the students and in their own language and understanding”.
Video game-based history lessons are taught to students from 5th to 8th grade: “Everyone benefits from this program. Obvious. The games that the students play are different, depending on the age of the children, depending on the subject that is taught in that class. And children don’t play every hour. He would be bored. Or we would turn the hours into something we don’t want”.
The history classes taught by teacher Iulia Onac combine the useful with the pleasant. “Learn by playing. They are involved there, they have to walk the streets, they have to observe the details. They are much more attentive, their attention span is clearly greater than if I showed them a picture and they would leave out many, many details“, teacher Iulia Onac also stated.
The “Games in School” project is already running in 40 schools in the country. Subjects such as history, mathematics and English are taught with the help of video games.
