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TGB + Homeschooling
TGB + Homeschooling
| Name: | Jay Jennings | |
|---|---|---|
| Date Posted: | Nov 12, 2006 | |
| Rating: |  3.7 out of 5 | |
| Public: | YES | |
| Comments: | YES | |
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| Profile Page: | View profile page for Jay Jennings |
Blog post
My kids are homeschooled and my son Tom (age 12) is a game freak, which is typical. What's not typical is that we're doing a rather "eclectic" version of homeschooling, almost "unschooling" and so we don't have a formal curriculum.
Which means that writing a game with TGB can count towards actual schoolwork. Which is cool for me, because I really won't mind helping him with his homework. =:)
So the plan starting Monday is to map out a game, design the whole thing, build it, and then (assuming it's good enough) sell it. Think of all the school-type subjects that can be incorporated in such a fun task.
I'll try and post here at least once a week with our progress, and I'll even have Tom throw in a post every once in a while (that's spelling, English composition, typing, and who knows what else!).
Which means that writing a game with TGB can count towards actual schoolwork. Which is cool for me, because I really won't mind helping him with his homework. =:)
So the plan starting Monday is to map out a game, design the whole thing, build it, and then (assuming it's good enough) sell it. Think of all the school-type subjects that can be incorporated in such a fun task.
I'll try and post here at least once a week with our progress, and I'll even have Tom throw in a post every once in a while (that's spelling, English composition, typing, and who knows what else!).
Recent Blog Posts
| List: | 11/18/06 - First Session Down, A Zillion to Go! 11/12/06 - TGB + Homeschooling |
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Submit your own resources!| Jacob Williams (Nov 12, 2006 at 05:42 GMT) |
Jacob
| Tank Dork (Nov 12, 2006 at 10:23 GMT) |
Sounds like a good learning experience.. and maybe a start to a life of game engineering :)
| Sam Redfern (Nov 12, 2006 at 11:09 GMT) |
It reminds me of the day I learned about arrays... I was 11 yrs old and trying to make an adventure game (like the original Adventure). I knew I needed something new.. and then I discovered arrays...
I often feel sorry for my (university) students who have to learn arrays in a hurried, pressurised and ultimately quite abstract way. They're learning because they're told to, not because they see how this new concept is immediately useful.
| Samuel Harper (Nov 12, 2006 at 14:44 GMT) |
That's a great idea. My kids are home schooled as well - we've been working on games for about one year. I also gave a class to some of their home schooled friends last spring as well.
It's a great way to get kids involved with many different aspects (math, coding, project planning, art,etc.)
We started with game maker (and a great book just came out for it) and Blitz3D - but just moved over to Torque a few months ago - and our games just got much richer and the kids became more motivated (with Torque and all the content packs - the kids can make something playable quicker).
Good luck!
Sam
| Neo Binedell (Nov 12, 2006 at 18:19 GMT) |
start wanting to rotate stuff in a cool environment (e.g. game dev), etc ;p
If kids are taught the application in an entertaining, visual and useful way concepts are
grasped much much quicker and retained as they are used on a daily basis.
good luck...
| Clint Herron (Nov 12, 2006 at 21:20 GMT) |
| David Higgins (Nov 13, 2006 at 02:02 GMT) |
| Dx (Nov 13, 2006 at 05:17 GMT) |
Unfortunately everything has it's draw backs, i mean as i said it's a very good thing to do, just need to consider social implications, obviously introducing your child to this kind of thing, this early would make him pretty bright, also teaching him the value of patience and social understanding as well as how to relax would be very good continuous lessons to teach and would certainly aide your child later in life.
anyway, thats just my opinion, it's amazing how much ironic the chaos theory is ('a guy walks down a street, obviously doesn't want to be robbed or anything so he picks up the pace and looks around so that he can both reach his destination quicker and spot incoming danger quicker, this way he should easily avoid trouble. A group of kids standing around talking to each other bored out of their minds. One of the group spots the guy, he's walking quickly and looking around a lot, clearly displaying traits of fear, theres no reason for the guy to be scared, after all it is during the day, perhaps he has a lot of money on him, he brings this to the attention of the rest of the kids, they follow the guy and rob him' read this scenario and think about how it applies to parenting) but anyway, I'm not a genius in any sense of the word, pretty much the opposite, also i don't have any kids so really i shouldn't comment, just thought I'd throw in a couple of comments.
hope you child gets along well (which I'm sure he will), be interested in further updates.
Dx
Edited on Nov 13, 2006 05:26 GMT
| Ray Noolness Gebhardt (Nov 13, 2006 at 14:44 GMT) |
| Clint Herron (Nov 13, 2006 at 17:53 GMT) |
| David Higgins (Nov 13, 2006 at 20:31 GMT) |
He's already working on things like level designs and such, he designed a few race track maps for me to integrate into one of my game ideas -- he says there "cool" and he wants to "tear up the track" -- he's also already given feedback on quite a few things, such as "look and feel" as well as "game play" in some games I've been working on, as well as some of the demo's and beta's that have been floating around.
Minigolf Mania, for example, from the eyes of a five year old is .. "Cool dude", "Ahahaha, the ball went over the wall", "Dad Dad, Look at that, I made the ball jump up", etc, etc ... I'm sure if I thought about it longer, or just sat down with him and let him play some more, I could get a whole lot more comments out of him on it ...
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