Cognitive Flow
M3.U3.A3
What is Cognitive flow?
Mihaly Csíkszentmihályi, a psychologist that has been studying this for numerous years describes flow as, being completely involved in an activity for its own sake. The ego falls away. Time flies. Every action, movement, and thought follows inevitably from the previous one, like playing jazz. Your whole being is involved, and you're using your skills to the utmost. (Cherry)
Many people can experience flow in different ways, reading a book, exercising, playing sports, drawing/painting, writing, playing games, etc…
Csíkszentmihályi, came up with a diagram that depicts how to enter or engage in flow.
You can see in the diagram where Flow is. You experience flow when you are being challenged and also using your skills at a high level. So many athletes before a game try and ‘get in the zone.’ Performance/Learning/Happiness are all best had when that person is in flow or in the zone.
Educators are trying to incorporate flow into the schools. But how? It seems that students are getting less and less interesting in education and schooling. Games are a great way to learn. When people play games many of them can experience flow because great games are designed in a manor to hook the audience and keep them engaged without realizing how much time has gone by or the fact that they missed dinner.
James Paul Gee, a professor at Arizona State University has 13 principles that games use to hook and engage people. He breaks these 13 principles into three categories. Below is a 23 min video as well as all of his principles outlined.
Category 1 - - - Empowered Learners
Principle 1: Agent/Co-Designer
- When learning/playing they must feel like what they do matters.
Principle 2: Customization
- Playing and learning in a new way.
- Allow you to try new things
Principle 3: Identity
- Who am I? What am I going to get from this?
- Trying on new skills & multiple possibilities
Principle 4: Manipulation
- The choices you make change the outcome.
- Games provide tools to involve body & mind
Category 2 - - - Problem Based Learning
Principle 1: Well-Ordered Problems
- Giving proper problems that allow more complex ones to be added later on
- Sequencing
o Nobody starts on the last level. You build your way up.
Principle 2: Pleasantly Frustrating
- When you feel a challenge and some accomplishment when you solve it.
- You know if you put enough effort into it, you can do it.
- This is primarily where flow happens
Principle 3: The Cycle of Expertise
- Challenge => Practice => Knowledge => Mastery
- Learning is best displayed when you are given a Challenge. You then Practice this challenge until it becomes basic knowledge. Once it becomes basic knowledge and you have mastered it then you build upon it with a higher degree of difficulty.
Principle 4: Information
- Just in time
o You get information when you need it.
- On Demand
o I’m lost I need help
Principle 5: Fish Tank
- You start with a sample or base then add more complexity over time
Principle 6: Sandboxes
- Safe place to try new things and take risks w/o being judged
Principle 7: Skills as Strategies
- Focusing on skills and practicing with a goal in mind.
- Not focusing on how much you practice but rather accomplishing your goal
Category 3 - - - Deep Understanding
Principle 1: System Thinking
- Thinking how variables come together to solve problems and accomplish goals
Principle 2: Situated Meaning
- Things we do and see / Actions without only verbal meaning
- Many times we are flooded with text and learning is best done my doing, seeing, and experiencing.
o ‘A picture paints a thousand words’
I really enjoyed this video because for me playing sports and playing (video or board) games I experience flow much more often than I do at other times. For me, I thoroughly enjoy engaging in sports and can often play without realizing how much time was actually spent. Since I also experience this while playing video games I liked the way Gee broke down the learning and engagement that video game designers put into the game. It was a great visualization of how I as a teacher need to engage my students. Students are disinterested in todays format of teaching. Not that I agree with this form of teaching in any decade but now more than ever with how ADD we are as a society (technology and modern living having has a primary effect of that) we need to change the way we educate people. Simply standing in front of the class will NOT cut it anymore. So this format of introducing games more into the classroom as a fundamental form of learning is great. People truly learn and engage what interest them. Lectures do NOT interest them. To be honest, this lengthy blog entry is entirely what 21st century teaching is not about.
Learning will be done once children engage and enjoy what they are doing.
High Skill Level + High Challenge = FLOW
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