New online game develops the media literacy of children in pre-school
A joint effort by Helsinki City Library, the City of Helsinki Department of Early Education and Care and Aniway Oy, the Aparaattisaari learning environment for children in pre-school has been finished. The game supports the development of children’s media literacy and information and communication technology skills.
A learning environment that is freely available online, Aparaattisaari / Gadget Island includes both the game and functional learning sessions intended to support education. It is the first game intended for pre-school education that has been produced by the public and private sector together. Gadget Island supports the goals of the Core Curriculum for Pre-school Education 2016 and has received support from the Ministry of Education and Culture.
– Gadget Island is easy to use and fully spoken, so it can also be played by children who are learning to read. The idea is that the player tries to solve the mystery of the mill on the Gadget Island together with animals living on the island, says the leader of the game project, Project Coordinator Päivi Leppänen from Helsinki City Library.
– The story-based learning environment supports things like the child’s logical thinking, critical assessment of information and development of fine motor skills, or the co-operation between the hand and the eye. The child will also learn to identify and name various communications devices and their purpose of use.
Another goal is for children to learn to choose age-appropriate films, games or TV programmes on the basis of symbols and to get information about acting safely online. The game tells children what to do if they run into inappropriate or scary content while using media. During the adventures on the island, the game also aims to provide pre-school children with information about sharing photos online or on their mobile phone, for example.
A one-year co-operation project
The learning environment was developed in a year-long co-operation project. The results of the work are intended for use by all pre-school groups in Finland, and the children and their teachers are welcome to play the game at the local library.
The address of the learning environment is aparaattisaari.fi, and it is available in Finnish, Swedish and English.
In order to embark on adventures on the Aparaattisaari island, the user will need a new, high-performance tablet or PC. The game uses HTML5 technology and works in browsers like Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox and Safari, but not Internet Explorer. Gadt Island is CC-licensed, which means that anyone can develop it further as long as the intention is not to gain commercial benefit (BY-NC-SA).
Text: Sari Lehikoinen
Picture: Gadget Island