An exploration of video games and their childhood impact on myself as a growingly 'literate' historian and educator today

Don't laugh I wasn't that much of a nerdy child, honest :D

In the vast expanse of this world, and of all its great and fascinating features, one thing has stood out above the rest as an unwavering obsession, a source of both great enjoyment and educational drive within my life. This special something for me has always been 'history'. While other kids have enjoyed their own talents in sport, art, readings or any other of the countless interests that possess the childhood and adult mind alike, it has always been history that has motivated me as a person, to expand my knowledge and understanding of the world around me.  History is central to the way I interpret my surrounding, things that I read, things that I see, things that I do or think about doing. It informs me to act appropriately, or predict the actions of others, the causation of events and defines who I am. As such while some may see 'literate' to mean able to read and write in ones native language, it should come as no surprise that the concept of being 'historically literate' is of much greater interest to me.

So what is historical literacy? Well to put it one way, historical literacy is the ability to recognise, understand, interpret and utilise sources of historical information or texts appropriately within the course of historical investigation (NSW DET, 2007). While it maybe interconnected with traditional conventions of literacy, such as speaking, listening, reading and writing, it can be expanded out to include a greater focus on historically relevent skills or focyus, as as such can be seen as a literacy form in its own right under the idea of multiliteracies (Cazden, Cope, Fairclough, Gee, et al. 1996). Other features of historical literacy include the ability to construct and appoprietly utilise relevant historical texts/tools, understand historical codes (images, symbles and vocabulary), in addition to the ability to think critically, recognise subjectivity or bias, the sequential order of time and its relationship with space, empathise with the past as well as recogne the impacts of ones own beliefs on our assessment of history ( Freebody and Luke, 1990; Santoro, 2004). With that tongue twister in mind (sorry :D), it is clear that historical literacy is complex and incorporates an endless breath of skills, knowledge and understanding, and as such must be developed as a lifelong continuum of learning and change (NSW DET, 2007).

Thinking back today about what foundations lay beneath this lifelong obsession have lead me to one resounding, and perhaps surprising answer, PC games. Yes you heard that right, far from numbing the mind, it has been video game classic like Age of Empire, Civilization and the Total War series, that I now attribute to not only bringing great warmth to my youth, but to have also drove me on a lifelong educational endeavour that continues to shape me as a increasingly literate person today. For this reason I will be exploring my childhood memories in order to seek an understanding of the development of my earliest historical literacy, and how it intersects with both my formal educational development (school) and that gained (informally) through my exposure to historically based video games. To best highlight my literacy progression I will be utilising the 'Four Resources Model' outlined by Freebody and Luke (1990), which categorised literacy into the four components of 'code breaker', 'text participant', 'text user' and 'text analyist', to denote different significant moments in my historical literacy development (Anstey & Bull, 2004). 

Before looking at my own experiences, I would first like to make a note on video games as a mechanism in broader society. Perhaps most significantly video games, along with graphic movies have long been at the spearhead of a great international controversy predicting the decline of modern youths (a perpetually generation fear recognisable to any ‘historically literate’ person in sources beyond the introduction of rock and roll culture, to antiquity in Ancient Greece and Rome). This fear has given rise to the conception that video games are not only educationally damaging and brainless, but also lack the teachings of morality or the physical benefits of a childhood outdoors. For these latter points I will not discuss, but in regards to educational benefits, the blank cheque approach of dismissing video games as brainless busy activity has long struck a cord with me. As such whilst I would like to note that I am neither suggesting mainstream video games as an educational tool, nor that the information contained within supposedly ‘historical based games’ is even close to a good source of historical information for children, they have in my experience instilled me with both a passion and skills related to my greater development as a historically literate individual.

 

Through video games I feel I could (to a degree) better empathise with many of the tactical decisions and difficulties faced by personalities of the past.

 Workings backwards now, two key skills/tools critical to the development of myself as a literate historian can be attributed to my early exposure to them during my casual enjoyment of history based video games. These are the skills of map reading and timelines. Within most strategy games there is a clear sequential order in which era's of human history are mapped and played out. The games themselves often include detailed timelines structured identically to that which is used in formal historical inquiry, but simple playing of the games alone was more then enough to instill within my understanding the concept that history takes place in a specific order and that civilisations, technologies and events all developed as a consequence of those before them. Big deal right? Well it may not sound like a mean feat to you today, but it is perhaps the most fundamental realisations for a developing historian, and allows a historically literate person to recognise different times as both interrelated along a time continuum, as well as separated by their contexts in time. This is a realisation essential to operate as an effective historical 'text participant', as it allows one to both link contextually relevant events together as a chain and explain the causation's of certain historical decisions or events evident within texts being examined (Freebody & Luke, 1990). Similarly this understanding of the sequence of time allows a 'text user' to discern that other events, beliefs, etc, may likewise be separated by time or space, and thus not relevant to the particular context of the historical text, such as separating their contemporary beliefs from those within a historical text (Freebody & Luke, 1990).

In regards to functional timelines and mapping, it is evident that my exposure to both during my early PC game experiences allowed me to become familiar with the features and structures of these two tools of a literate historian. This awareness and understanding of the meaning behind the symbols and structure of maps and timelines is greatly reflective of what Freebody and Luke (1990) have termed a 'code breaker', whereby an individual becomes increasingly literate as they begin to recognise the meanings behind the codes and structures which make up a text (language, symbols, grammar, etc) (Anstey & Bull, 2004). As such it seems apparent that my experience using these texts through strategy games perpetuated growth in my historical literacy, aiding me to become a competent 'code breaker' when faced with the need to utilise or construct historical timelines or maps in my formal education (Freebody & Luke, 1990).

Other important developments of my historical literacy can also be seen to intersect my game experiences, and though it is likely that I would have developed them irrespective of my fascination for history based games, I feel that it has been these games that have both prompted my great passion for history, and helped me reach levels of historical literacy earlier then many of my peers. Though it is for the most part forever shrouded in the fallibility of my distant memory, it is apparent that a time existed when all texts were accepted equally in informing my own mini inquires or attempts to develop a conception of history. Within this period it is likely that video games, movies and toys (including me beloved Lego, which featured its own depictions of historical societies such as Ancient Egypt, pirates and samurai among others) were in my mind just as good a source of information as a history book, or had I ever been exposed to one a primary source. From my reflections I have been able to narrow down a vague memory in which I realised that Roman legionary had squared shields, while Greek hoplites fought with round ones (naturally as a young boy I was more interested in the warriors, then the cultures themselves, but that's gender socialisation for you). So how is this significant? Well in the Age of Empires game the complete contradictory scenario is presented (ie Legionaries with round shields and hoplites with square), this is a huge historical error, and when it became apparent to me two significant literacy processes were evident. 1) I must have been utilising my own existing knowledge (that gained beforehand from the video game text Age of Empires) to compare and comprehend the incoming information drawn from the second text (evidence of a working 'text participant'). 2) I was able to recognise that the second source, being a formal historical text, was more reliable and accurate then the information contained within the video game as a mechanism for entertainment. This demonstrates a point in my development in which a discovery of contradiction within texts prompted me to look beyond the texts themselves, to the purpose of each to resolve the contradiction. Freebody and Luke (1990), outline that an effective 'text user' is aware of the purpose of the texts, and how this may influence the appropriate use of the text in certain contexts. In this case the text was recognised as a primarily entertainment mechanism (rather then educational), and as such not inherently appropriate for application to my formal understandings of history (context), without further support from more reliable texts, thus representing an important step I have taken as a 'text user' (Anstey & Bull, 2004; Freebody & Luke, 1990).

Historical legion

Age of Empires legion

   

I know this is not doing me any favours in regards to my 'not being a nerdy kid statement', however for my own somewhat odd desire, I have map this development of my early childhood history literacy into a little rip off of the Age of Empires 1 technology tree starting from the 'stone ages' of my interest in history to using tools in the 'tool age', to the development of a solid base of historical literacy in the 'bronze' and later 'iron ages' :P

Those discussed here in relation to the interconnection of my historical based video game experience and my initial developments in historical literacy represent much of my earliest memories of encounters with history, and though history occupies a small place in primary school, quite paradoxically it was video games, on the contrary to numbing my mind, that contributed at least equally greatly to my historical development in these early years. Whether this mixing of questionably factual entertainment information as background knowledge with my more formal development as a historically literate person is seen as a positive or negative is debatable, but I suspect that it is the natural process in which a majority of students of history begin their journey to historical literacy. As entertainment mediums are both accessible and enjoyable, I find that almost invariably peoples interest and knowledge have been sparked by such things as stories, video games and movies as a child. With this in mind I would like to conclude this topic by recognising that although an alarming amount of grown adults continue to hold such texts as the basis for their understanding of history, entertainments mediums are not in themselves inherently damaging or impeding to a child's historical literacy progression. On the contrary it is rather the development, or failure to develop the essential reflective skills central to becoming an effective and discerning 'text user' that will dictate how a historically literate person will interact with such texts, and the background knowledge absorbed from them subconsciously both as a child and adult (Freebody & Luke, 1990).

Reference List:

Anstey, M., & Bull, G. (2004). The Literacy Labyrinth (2^nd ed.). Frenchs Forest: Pearson Education Australia.

Cazden, C., Cope, B., Fairclough, N., Gee, J., et al. (1996). A pedagogy of multiliteracies: Designing social futures. Harvard Educational Review, 66(1), 60-92.


Freebody, P., & Luke, A. (1990). Literacies programs: Debates and demands in cultural context. Prospect: Australian Journal of TESOL, 5(7), 7-16.


New South Wales Department of Education and Training (NSW DET). (2007). Teaching litracy in history in Year 7. New South Wales: Department of Education and Training. Retrieved from http://blackboard.newcastle.edu.au/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_id=_2_1&url=%2fwebapps%2fblackboard%2fexecute%2flauncher%3ftype%3dCourse%26id%3d_1320122_1%26url%3d (24 march, 2010).

Santoro, N. (2004). Using the four resources model across the curriculum. In A. Healy & E. Honan (Eds.), Text Next (51-67). Newtown: Primary English Teaching Association.