[staff] Color War, @RedTeam and Play in Informal Learning Environments
What does Color War look like on the internet?
For years growing up, I went to summer camp. While being filled with a host of activities, one of the most hyped (and occasionally actually exciting) of those was color war, in which the entire camp was split into two teams each represented by a color. You'd wear your color, and participate in a wide range of sports and arts competitions, and hopefully not break your arm. (I didn't always manage to achieve that last one.)
Now color war has made it to the internet. And yes, it's way cooler than it was in camp. Developed by the always innovative Zefrank, teams have organized via twitter and a variety of social media sites across the web, and have engaged players in time limited, creative games, including a rendition of rock, paper, scissors via flickr.
I entered color war, and joined a team (red), as did a number of colleagues, friends and teens that I know via my work here at Global Kids. It's been a lot of fun, creating photo renditions of rock/paper/scissors (see above and after the jump) and bantering about who has a better team, even laying down some lighthearted smack talk.
Among the interesting things about this color war for me, and there are many, are its effects in terms of shifting norms and conceptions of what the educator/learner relationship can look like in the digital age, something I've written about before. In the past I discussed how changes to this relationship might challenge traditional conceptions of how educators share opinion as a result of their participation in informal communication settings (like blogs and social networks, as opposed to classrooms or afterschool programs) as well as what it means to work with young people both in the context of them being learners and at the same time employees. What's striking to me about color war though is its overt playfulness, and what that playfulness means in the context of this educator/learner relationship.
 |
Play is something that is currently spoken a lot about in the context of new media literacies, a skill that's been deemed by many (including us here at Global Kids) as one important for young people to develop so that they're prepared to approach problems in a creative, experimental way. Rarely, though, do I hear about the value of play as something that might occur in the educator/learner relationship. What implications does play have here? What immediately comes to mind is deepening of trust, creation of safe contexts for learners to display (and get feedback on) both ideas and skills without risk, and opportunities for the kind of collaborations that might not normally happen in an educator/learner context. (The photo with the guitars, for example, was partly conceived by me, and executed with great skill in record time by a teen I work with.)
Should we be thinking about learning models where play is more present for all involved, not just for those deemed to be learners? If so, are there ways that this should look, and ways it should not? As I continue to have fun, and play, I'll consider these questions and what they mean for the larger ecology of learning that we're engaging in here at Global Kids. Until next time, go Red team!
