I was nine years old when I stopped enjoying school, and my father, an educator himself, was surprised.
“What changed?” He asked me. I considered the question as seriously as a nine year old can, and told him.
“Last year, in second grade,” I explained, “we did fun things, like write poems for Halloween. This year, our Halloween homework is to memorize these spelling words. It’s boring! Why don’t they ask us to do something fun with the spelling words, like write a poem using them?”
For years, my dad used that story as a quick explanation of how games can be educational without being complicated. And yet still, twenty years later, education across the United States is suffering and students are “bored” in most classes. Read more ›