It was a great experience to be interviewed in VR on Singularity Watch, S01 E09, about video game-based learning in foreign language & culture education, and the new, exciting frontiers of VR in gaming, learning and education.
Thank you!
Uncategorized
My book on Dante’s Divine Comedy – “Locus Amoenus: New Instruments of Analysis of the Comedy” is out!
Uncategorizedhttp://www.longo-editore.it/scheda_libro.php?id=1637
Bregni, Simone
Locus amoenus
Nuovi strumenti di analisi della Commedia, 2020
Il Portico n. 186
pp. 248, ISBN 9788893500593
My book on Dante’s Comedy, intertextuality and the Classical tradition was published by Longo Editore, Ravenna, Italy, on October 28, 2020. It is available on Amazon Italy, Ibs Italy, Feltrinelli and more.
Il mio libro sulla Commedia, intertestualità e tradizione classica è stato pubblicato da Longo Editore, Ravenna, il 28 ottobre 2020; è disponibile su Amazon Italia, IBS, Feltrinelli e altre piattaforme di acquisti di libri online. Colleghi in USA, se siete interessati a leggerlo, contattatemi. Ho un certo numero di copie a disposizione; sarei grato delle vostre recensioni su Amazon Italia e altre piattaforme online.
Distance-Learning Workshop on VGBL in ESL/FL Learning – German-American Center of Stuttgart (DAZ), Germany
UncategorizedToday I delivered a two-hour distance-learning workshop on video game-based foreign language learning (with a focus on ESL) for the German-American Center, Deutsch-Amerikanisches Zentrum / James-F.-Byrnes-Institut in Stuttgart, Germany to an audience of approximately 60 ESL teachers from the St. Louis Sister Cities of Stuttgart, Germany, and Samara, Russia. The workshop, part of the celebrations for the 60th anniversary of the St. Louis/Stuttgart Sister Cities Program, was supposed to take place in Stuttgart. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the interactive, multimedia-based workshop was conducted in real time online, including a Q&A session. I would like to thank DAZ and the Sister Cities Program for this opportunity to share my VGBL scholarship and teaching practices as a professor at Saint Louis University, Department of Languages, Literatures, & Cultures, SLU Italian Studies Program.
Ludic Language Pedagogy Journal
UncategorizedVery excited to serve as a reviewer for Ludic Language Pedagogy Journal! Thank you co-editors Jonathan deHaan and James York for inviting me.
I love my pixel-art avatar that James made. It is a PETSCII version of a portrait photo. It is made with Retrocam first https://8bitartwork.co.uk/
Looking forward to contributing and reviewing!
◣ First article by Jonathan deHaan: http://bit.ly/2KfbVYX
#literacy | #multiliteracies | #participation
◣ First “walkthrough” by James York: http://bit.ly/32qf9Pr
#boardagmes | #TBLT | #mediation
#LLPJournal #GBLTeaching #gamebased #GBL #english #efl #esl # #languages
Developing a VGBL-based “Intro to the Classical Humanities” course & Assassin’s Creed Odyssey’s Discovery Tour Mode.
Assassin's Creed Discovery Tour, Assassin's Creed Odyssey, Discovery Tour, Game-Based Learning, Intro to the Classical Humanities, Microsoft, Non-serious gaming, PlayStation, Sony, Uncategorized, Video Game-Based Language Learning, Video Game-Based Learning, Video Games in Foreign Language Teaching & Learning, XboxThe Discovery Tour Mode released today for Assassin’s Creed Odyssey is a fantastic addition to an already excellent game. I am very excited about its release, particularly because I am currently developing a video game-based learning / digital media learning “Intro to the Classical Humanities” course with my colleague in the Classics program, Dr. Joan Hart-Hasler.
I studied Classics for most of my life (12 years of Latin coursework, 10 years of Greek). I fell in love with the Greco-Roman civilization by the time I was 14. I was very impressed with the re-construction of Hellenistic Alexandria in Assassin’s Creed Origins, its history, monuments, everyday life and even the use of Koine Greek by non-playable characters (NPC). The lexicon and pronunciation of the ancient common language of the Greek empire has been carefully, effectively and convincingly re-constructed. Now, I cannot wait to explore their tour of Classical Greece and re-construction of the language, life and culture, and explore its pedagogical uses in our college course. “Intro to the Classical Humanities’ will be taught in English, as a large first-year experience course. Besides video game-based learning, I plan to include graphic novels and other digital media. I hope to present it to the undergraduate course committee sometime this fall, and teach it next spring.
What is most exciting about the inclusion of the Discovery Tour, in my opinion, is that it makes digital game-based learning/quest-based learning accessible to high-school and, in some cases, even middle school students. In fact, it is a “pacific” mode, devoid of violence.
Kudos Ubisoft & merci Maxime Durand & team!
Image: Koine Greek – Source: Hector Abuid on Flickr [https://www.flickr.com/photos/21536074@N00/2560077543]
Wrapping up
UncategorizedThank you @jones360! Grazie Liliana!
For me, learning is what happens during the ‘inbetween’. Not so much The Upside Down, but rather the ‘inbetween’.
The ‘inbetween’ refers to what is in between all of the quizzes, exams, scaffolded projects, structured dialogue, and homework tasks. The ‘inbetween’ is the process of learning a language, it is what happens internally or when you are least expecting it; it is writing verb conjugations over and over again, making your own connections, figuring words out through context or association, correcting your grammar, and helping your peers; it is looking up word meanings via images on Google.it, laughing with an accent, and troubleshooting tech; it is the process of laughing through hour long discussions on the variety of pastas that can be consumed at just one meal, the process of learning the steps of a video game through trial and error, and the process of texting your final project classmates…
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Intensive Italian for Gamers – Giorno 21
UncategorizedGrazie @Jones360! She is a brilliant graduate student on her way to pursue a Ph.D. She is taking my Intensive Italian for Gamers this semester as a means to explore new trends in second/foreign language acquisition.
¡Ciao!
mercoledì 20 marzo
Per the ush, as the students go along entering class and warming up for our Wednesday in Intensive Italian, Simone has a game playing on the big screen on the right, and our daily plan presented on the left.
🎮 Gioco: we continue to immerse ourselves with input and activities from Assassin’s Creed and when I came in to the class a fellow student was marching Ezio around the streets of Firenze vecchio. The background music was playing, and while most students were paying attention to the game, some were paying attention to their cell phones. I popped in a wee bit later than normal, just as Simone asked the giocatore to finire. Our classmate closed out to the main menu, and arrowed down to esci. I thought to myself ‘that means to go out or exit’. Then, ‘wait a minute, how do I…
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The elevator pitch
UncategorizedGrazie @Jones360!
I was in Georgia last weekend for a Graduate student conference and during a coffee convo with a Hispanic Linguistics professor I was asked about this class, “wait – what? Italian for Gamers?”…”Intensive Italian?”…”Gaming?”. Our chat was actually put on a brief hold while the professor took a brief time out to Google the class. #Simoneforthewin
And, as I did my elevator pitch of this class, so many of the intentions, angles, and purposes behind all of the pedagogical strategies and methods became a lot clearer and more apparent to me. Sometimes it just takes you explaining something to someone else for you to really fully understand it in a more general way and to appreciate it from an outside perspective. Explaining the class to someone who had absolutely no idea about what it entailed allowed me to bring myself outside of the nitty-gritty details of indefinite plural articles, vocabulary…
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Intensive Italian for Gamers – giorni 9, 10 e 11
UncategorizedIf you are curious about my Intensive Italian for Gamers course, Spanish grad student Lillian Jones is blogging about the experience!
¡ciao!
Otto giorni since I have written about Italian 1200. Perché so many giorni have passed, and why have they passed so quickly? Perché that is what time does. It moves forward at its own pace. It is a constant pace, that oh 👆, human beings have set forth for us to keep our lives organized. Which I am totally fine with, of course. Being a mixture of mostly Welsh, German, and a wee bit o’ Swedish, I definitely love a good ol’ prompt time schedule. But the thing about time is that it keeps going, and if you are not on the time train, and swaddled in for the ride, then you may just get left behind. Perhaps you’ll catch ahold of the caboose with one hand, or even trot along the tracks with a satchel slung over your shoulder. Either way, the point is – to stay…
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Intensive Italian for Gamers – giorno 1
UncategorizedLillian is a Spanish M.A. student who is taking my Intensive Italian for Gamers course this semester!
* * *
14 lunedi, gennaio
¡Ciao!
This seems to be the magical word in Italian. It appears to be a powerful word, in such that it can open up a conversation, as well as bring it to a halt. ¡Ciao! seems to be able to control the mood of a conversation that could potentially take place, brought, or not brought on the essence of, in fact, itself.
I have been looking forward to this class for many reasons. My motivations for enrolling in the class were primarily the sheer joy of learning another language, and the culture enveloped in language. Secondly, I have heard and read many wonderful things about this specific class #IntensiveItalian4GamersSLU, in person from students who have previously taken the class, articles in the media, and fellow colleagues and faculty. I will forever and always be a student and will never cease to take…
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Simone Bregni, Ph.D. 