No Pain No gain

One of the many sayings that we have to "help" someone when they are going through a difficult task is "no pain no gain". I was thinking about how much of that we relate to teaching and learning. With the CRCT test scores looming I wonder could the same test scores have been extrapolated and analyzed for the students in 3, 5, 8, grades etc if they used MMORPG (massive multiplayer online role playing game) for the testing? Could navigating and answering questions through timed tasks in virtual world similar to Second life have given the same information while having the element of fun? Could a game to prepare students to test for the SAT be more beneficial than that of the weekend study classes or general online study. I think so. I believe that our students could learn and test better if we used these forms of learning to enhance lecture time. Now, I don't underestimate students going onto the internet and getting the cheat codes and texting moves to their friends but I am saying that I do believe that instruction time would be more engaging if the teacher went in as a master player and instructed through one of these games. I also believe that we would more effectively gage learning and learning gaps through some of these tools. You be the judge though.

http://www.grockit.com/

http://news.filefront.com/mmorpg-learning-games-real-life-job-skills/