The 5 September 2009 Economist reports on the opening of Quest to Learn, a new publicly funded school in New York. Closing excerpt:
The school plans to admit pupils at the age of 12 and keep them until they are 18, so the first batch will not leave until 2016. If it fails, traditionalists will no doubt scoff at the idea that teaching through playing games was ever seriously entertained. If it succeeds, though, it will provide a model that could make chalk and talk redundant. And it will have shown that in education, as in other fields of activity, it is not enough just to apply new technologies to existing processes—for maximum effect you have to apply them in new and imaginative ways.
There is plenty else of interest and value on the Institute of Play's web site, including this list of references relating to game-based learning.
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