In analogy to the pedagogical core idea of Bildung as developed by German idealist philosophers, especially Wilhelm von Humboldt, in the 19th century, the term self-education describes a process of changing world references and self-references, that is, transformations of framings or world views as a whole. Structurally, self-education can be seen as a highly complex and reflexive form of learning (cf., e.g., the higher stages of learning in Gregory Bateson’s learning theory) and as a result of a certain form of “experience” (in the sense of John Dewey). Self-educational processes cannot be forced by other persons (i.e., parents or teachers). Thus, didactic strategies to provoke and facilitate self-educational processes have to aim on the one hand towards achieving appropriate, stimulating situations, opportunities and environments, and on the other hand towards assisting and encouraging informal and non-formal processes of learning and self-education.
Published in Chapter:
(Self-) Educational Effects of Computer Gaming Cultures
Johannes Fromme (University of Magdeburg, Germany), Benjamin Jörissen (University of Magdeburg, Germany), and Alexander Unger (University of Magdeburg, Germany)
Copyright: © 2009
|Pages: 19
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-59904-808-6.ch043
Abstract
The goal of this chapter is to emphasize a certain notion of self-induced education, to discuss it in the context of digital games and to provide the means for assessing digital games as well as to give hints on their educational use. In the first section, the concept of “self-education” is introduced and distinguished against less complex learning phenomena. The second section discusses and analyses the different layers of “educational space” inherent to gaming software, providing the analytical means for the further sections. The third section presents and analyses educational aspects of single-player games, while the fourth section adds the socio-cultural impacts implied in multi-player communities. In conclusion, a synopsis is given, which sums up the main educational dimensions and connects them to aspects and analytical criteria, allowing a pedagogical assessment of digital games.