I have theorized at some length about the school; I would turn just for fun to some practical questions. Nothing serious and hopeless as how to get the school up and running, but some imaginary scenarios, things teachers might say, ways students might respond—a window onto the curriculum rolling along.
Maybe there will be special sessions once a week or so on obscenely important subjects such as technological and environmental ethics. And if to that end I get to teach on the interesting subject of videogames, I had better offer some cautionary advice, something like,
‘When you play a game, what kinds of things are you thinking about? You’re concentrating on what you’re doing, right? If it’s a sport that means seeing how you can get open for the ball; if it’s tag it means watching out for who’s it; if it’s a videogame, how to get to the next level. It’s like when you’re reading a book, right, in some ways; it’s somewhere between reading a book and watching TV, maybe—when you watch TV you don’t have to think as hard because you aren’t participating, and when you’re reading you have to think harder because it’s just words, no images, that you are looking at; your mind has to do the work of seeing what they describe.
‘Oddly enough, the less you’re thinking, the further you get from the outside world. Have you ever looked at someone who’s watching TV? What do they look like? [makes a face] Like a zombie, like a vegetable. And it’s hard to get their attention, right? It’s like they’re asleep, except watching TV just makes you sleepier. Now it can also be hard to get someone’s attention who’s playing a videogame or a sport or who’s reading or having a conversation—but for the opposite reason, because they’re engaged in the activity, not disengaged from all activity.
‘Is this making sense so far? We have our two basic situations: watching TV, which requires very little thought, and playing a videogame, which requires concentration and reaction to what’s happening in the game.
‘Why do we do these things, by the way? Because they’re fun, basically. But now I’m going to suggest that this is not a good enough reason; I’m going to suggest that you think about that question why as you play today, and let me know what you come up with. Don’t just have fun—think about why it’s fun, why it’s more fun to do it this way than some other way; how could it be even more fun? And think, is there something more than just enjoyment here—are you feeling anything else?’
[so we play Mario 3 for awhile and then reconvene] ‘I felt confused, mostly.’
‘Yeah, I wasn’t sure what we were supposed to do.’
‘I don’t know why I like playing, it’s just fun.’
‘I think it’s fun because you can jump and fly.’
‘So you do things you can’t do in real life?’
‘Yeah.’
‘How could it be more fun?’
‘If you could go more places.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Like if you could go back there, where those things are.’
‘Into the background, in new directions. Good. Did anyone come up with anything else. Anything, Roger?’
‘I don’t get how the blocks can float in the air. I never noticed it before. And after you break them, where do they go? I mean, the pieces disappear.’
‘What else could you do with them?’
‘Touch them at least. Pick them up and throw them.’
‘That’s it. I’m glad you were seeing some new things, or noticing things you never noticed. Even if you were a little bit confused, that’s something, isn’t it, that’s a new way of looking at the game. We’ll try this again sometime, but for right now there’s one more thing I want to focus on, and then we’ll move on to history.
‘Did anyone think about how the game works? Not like within the game, the rules and why you jump on the goombas and over the pits—but how the physical game, when you turn it on, produces those images and responds when you push buttons? It’s all wires and electricity, right? Although you’re participating in one sense, within the game, you’re doing nothing to make the game work after you’ve flipped it on—with or without you, it will sit there working patiently.
‘In that respect it’s like so many other machines we use every day without really noticing them—watches, phones, lights, air-conditioners. These things all exist for a purpose, they perform their function and no more—of course you could play with the lights, but that is wasteful, right; you could play with the phone, but what if you happen to dial the number of someone who’s sleeping or having a really bad day, or what if you dial 911—and again, if you’re just playing with it, you’re wasting electricity and time.
‘So what is it about games that makes it okay to play with them? Is it that we could say their purpose is to let us have fun, where the other things had their different purposes? Is it any more fun than flicking on and off the lights and making prank calls—especially when you consider that doing something you’re not supposed to can provide an added element of fun? And is it any less of a waste of electricity and time to sit there and play videogames?
‘Just let these kinds of questions, and the question about what makes it fun, and is it anything more than fun, sink in, keep them in the back of your mind, because we’ll look at this again another day.
‘Also, you might consider that there was a time—before my time, but not by much—when there were no videogames. A little before that, there were no personal computers, no cell phones; a little before that, no TV. People always say it’s annoying when older people say, “in my day, we didn’t have such and such, it was much harder, but things were better,” but I never thought it was annoying. It puts things in perspective, and makes you appreciate what you have; maybe it even reminds you that in most of the rest of the world, people still don’t have access to computers and TVs and all that; maybe it makes you realize, maybe things were better then, without all this unnecessary stuff and all the hassles that come with it. And then there’s the basic attraction to what is different, different ways of life, because if they didn’t have these things to occupy them, they must have had something else, and it’s interesting to see what that might have been like.
‘So just as an aside, there: I always felt like people who stopped listening as soon as someone older started to say, “in my day,” they were cutting themselves off from a lot of interesting and probably instructive experience. After a while, people would start to say “back in my day” with a certain mocking tone, like that, like self-mocking, because they knew no one would take it seriously. And maybe it is impossible, ultimately, to get people to listen to what is said for their benefit, and what will do them good and keep them from certain mistakes, because sometimes you can’t really understand something without doing it first yourself, and sometimes even things that are true don’t take on much weight until they are true, are important, for you.
‘Ah, what am I saying? I had a nice transition to history lined up, talking about the time when there were no videogames, and then I go off on this tangent. Oh well, something else to think about. So, where were we last time? Belle?’
‘Alexander the Great.’
‘Right, right. And who was his teacher?...’
There you go, a lesson on videogames for fourth- or fifth-graders, perilously verbose, probably, and not leaving enough room for student discussion, but delineating some ideas, making some connections and leaving some others for another time, or never to be said, and even repeating a few basic ideas so as to make sure that the kids are not totally lost, and might remember a little bit at the end of the day.
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