Can Video Games Promote Intergenerational Play & Literacy Learning?

Forty years of Sesame Street research has consistently demonstrated greater learning benefits when children co-view an educational television program, compared to viewing alone. Might benefits also accrue when adults and children use educational games together? On July 30, 2009, the Game Innovation Lab at the University of Southern California, the University of Michigan School of Education and Learning Sciences, and the Cooney Center, with the support of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, convened a workshop in which experts in cognition, developmental psychology, educational technology, and game design discussed and developed strategies to use intergenerational play to accelerate learning for children who are struggling to master literacy skills in the primary grades. Dr. Cynthia Chiong compiled findings from the workshop in the report, Can Video Games Promote Intergenerational Play & Literacy Learning? The report shares the latest research on adult-child play patterns with both digital and analog games and research-based design principles for creating intergenerational play patterns that help children learn in a variety of scenarios and settings.

Read the workshop participant mini-papers