Logging Into the Playground: How Digital Media Are Shaping Children’s Learning

The Cooney Center’s inaugural leadership forum was held at The McGraw-Hill Corporate Headquarters on May 9th, 2008. Key leaders from the fields of research, industry, policy, philanthropy, and education convened to examine how recent research and experimentation with interactive media such as games, mobile technologies, and other platforms can accelerate children’s literacy learning. Electronic Arts’ Bing Gordon delivered the keynote. The Center also released recent research and reports, including a national survey conducted with Common Sense Media that examines parents’ and educators’ attitudes regarding digital media use in young children, a white paper by James Paul Gee, Mary Lou Fulton Presidential Professor of Literacy Studies at Arizona State University and author of What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy, and a “new directions” report on learning for elementary-aged kids in a digital age, featuring interviews with more than 50 experts on literacy, educational media, children and family policy, and industry innovations.