Abstract #1830

Abstract: Games, Language and Literacy in L1 and L2
Thorkild Hanghøj*, Kristine Kabel, Signe Hannibal Jensen, Mads-Peter Mosberg Jensen, and Catherine Beavis*

Abstract
Digital games form a key part of many children and young people’s everyday life. Moreover, there exist a number of claims on the potential of games for developing literacy and language (Gee, 2003). Based on the widespread interest in the learning potential of games, there have been an increasing number of empirical studies, which look closer at how digital games may be used within the context of L1 (e.g. Beavis et al., 2017; Hanghøj, 2017) and L2 (e.g. Peterson, 2013; Jensen, 2017). However, there is a lack of overview of the knowledge on the use of games - both within research on L1 and L2 as well as across the two research fields.

In this paper, we wish to present preliminary findings from a systematic review on the empirical research on games, language and literacy within L1 and L2 in primary and secondary school. Given the assumed learning potential of games in students’ everyday lives, the review also includes studies that are conducted outside school contexts but relate to or have implications for the curricular aims of L1 and L2. Preliminary findings suggest that digital games have different status within the two subjects. Thus, several studies have shown positive effects on playing commercial games outside school on children’s learning of English as a second language - e.g. by expanding their vocabulary or communicative competence. At the same time, there exist relatively few studies on the use of commercial games within L2. Instead, the L2 research tends to focus more on using learning games. By comparison, there seem to be less indications of positive effects between children’s gameplay outside school and their performance within L1 - e.g. in relation to PISA assessments of reading (Borgonovi, 2016). At the same time, there exist a growing number of studies on the use of commercial games within L1 contexts. However, only few studies explore the interrelations between children's out of school gameplay and L1.

These differences do not only reflect the different status of digital games and game types within the L1 and L2 curricula, but also reflect broader differences between research traditions surrounding L1 and L2. In this way, our review tries to establish a cross disciplinary dialogue between research on games, language and literacies within L1 and L2. In summary, the aim of the paper is to discuss and conceptualize the relationship between 1) games, language and literacy, and 2) the research fields of L1 and L2, especially in relation to different research methodologies within the two fields and their different conceptions of literacy.

*Indicates paper presenter at the symposium.

Bios of presenters

Thorkild Hanghøj is associate professor at the Department of Communication and Psychology, Aalborg University. His research interests are within the field of Game-Based Learning, especially in relation to games and literacy, games and design thinking and the role of the teacher in facilitating games. He has conducted studies on how the use of computer games in L1 involve a dynamic interplay of knowledge practices and translations between in- and out-of-school domains. He now leads the GBL21 project, which explores how design-oriented approaches to games may develop students’ 21st century skills through game-related literacy practices in L1, Science and Math.

Thorkild Hanghøj is co-coordinator of CEAGAR, The Center for Applied Game Research at Aalborg University. He is also co-founder of NORDGOLD, the Nordic network for Game-Oriented Learning Design. He has been a visiting scholar at the Center for Games and Impact at Arizona State University and has published in both Danish and international research journals and anthologies. Together with colleagues, he is currently trying to establish GAMLIT, which is an international research network on GAMes and LITeracy.

Catherine Beavis holds a Chair in Education at Deakin University and is Deputy Director of REDI, Deakin University’s Director REDI: Research for Educational Impact, Deakin University's Strategic Research Centre for research in Education. Her work has a particular focus on digital culture, digital games, multimodality, the changing nature of text and literacy, and the implications of young people’s experience of the online world for contemporary English and Literacy curriculum, and on and offline learning. Her research looks particularly at digital games and young people’s engagement with them, exploring the ways in which games work as new textual worlds for players, embodying and extending ‘new’ literate and multimodal literacies and stretching and changing expectations about reading, narrative and participation.

Current studies explore literacy, learning and teaching in the digital age in the games-based classroom, learning with games in the informal learning context of the museum, and the ways in which international students in secondary schools use social media and the internet to maintain and develop connectedness It investigates how learners and teachers approach games, in and out of school differences, what happens to literacy, curriculum and pedagogy when games are brought into the classroom, how young people use and interact with digital games for diverse purposes, and the nature of games as both action and text.