Texas Schools Explore Immersive Gaming
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Garland Independent School District in Texas may be taking on schools in New York this spring in an interstate educational gaming tournament. Garland, which is new to educational gaming, is one of three districts in Texas that have recently begun integrating immersive gaming into the K-12 curriculum.
All three districts, which also include Ft. Worth Independent School District and Lamar Consolidated Independent School District, have adopted Tabula Digita's DimensionM as an educational tool. Tabula said it's working to put together a tournament between the Texas district and New York City Schools. Tabula has organized inter-school gaming tournaments in the past, including competitions at the annual FETC conference between teachers from different states. Regardless of whether the Garland-New York tournament takes place, Garland ISD said it plans to hold its own district tournament at the end of year.
"Garland ISD has worked hard to build an instructional environment rich with technology today's 21st century kids respond to," said Jim Hysaw, executive administrator of technology at Garland ISD, in a statement released this week. "Educational video games such as DimensionM, are a tool that clearly engage students, and we expect that to result in greater mastery of skills, higher test scores, collaboration and performance. We're very excited to explore all the ways this new technology can support our instructional efforts."
DimensionM is an immersive gaming environment focused on algebra and pre-algebra learning. It offers a 3D environment in which players carry out missions (lessons) in multi-player tournament-style games. Players face mathematical obstacles, which, when solved, allow them to advance and score points.
Tabula Digita recently launched a new version of the software, DimensionM Multiplayer 2.0, which added new curriculum content and offers instructional activities covering more than 200 math skills for students in grades 3 through 12.
Further information can be found here.