Learning has always been a 24-hour-a-day activity, but digital media have expanded the possibilities for continuous learning across many media platforms. In response to this change, game designers, educators, and researchers are coming together to explore how new media can help young people grow academically.

With innovative initiatives such as Quest to Learn, a New York City public school based on principles of game design, researchers have an opportunity to examine empirical data about how digital media affect young people's learning and to develop approaches to assess the quality of that learning.

The MacArthur Foundation supports research led by Jim Gee, a literacy scholar and professor at Arizona State University, on how to use alternative assessments to measure students' academic growth and whether they are acquiring new media skills. As the director and principal investigator of the 21st-century Assessment Project, Gee is working with ten other scholars to identify existing assessment approaches that can be used and/or improved in a digital context. The Project will also integrate new assessment techniques into Foundation- supported efforts, such as Quest to Learn, and conduct research to create new models.

The work has significant implications for educational institutions, which have traditionally relied on pen-and-paper tests, compared to the interactive and participatory learning approaches inspired by game design and other digital media.

"The current assessment system tells us what people know in terms of facts and information," said Gee. "It does not tell us whether they can solve problems."

Gee said new assessment approaches should focus on problem solving, innovation, and critical and creative thinking — skills that are necessary in a digital age. Assessment, especially as designed for digital environments like games, can provide real-time feedback to students and instructors and reveal the benefits of new, sometimes informal, approaches to learning.

The Project is developing assessment models for digital media initiatives including Quest Atlantis, an international learning and teaching project that uses a 3-D multiplayer game in educational tasks focused on science; the Digital Youth Network, a media literacy program in Chicago that bridges the learning gap between school and after- school activities; and Gamestar Mechanic, a project based at the Institute of Play that teaches children how to build games.

Gee uses two approaches: sociocultural assessment, which looks at how race, gender, and other social and cultural affiliations affect how an individual learns, and situational assessment, which focuses on the experiences individuals have as they learn.

Though the Project is inspired by digital media, the discussion about assessment approaches is independent of the effort. "What is new [in terms of sociocultural assessment] is extending the concept to digital media," Gee said.

Educators are taught about the culturally specific ways in which students learn, but the concept has not been extended to "peer culture," said Gee. For example, he said, social media are very popular among girls, but such digital media are not appreciated as a learning tool.

"We look at race, class, and ethnic groups but don't look at other elements of culture, such as communities of practice. Many kids are in digital cultures," Gee said. The term "communities of practice" refers to groups of people who share a concern or a passion for an activity and learn how to do it better over time through collective practice.

A key goal of the Project is to integrate assessment and learning. Valerie Shute, a professor at Florida State University and a participant in the Assessment Project, said Quest to Learn provides "the first opportunity to link assessment to gaming."

What game design and learning theory have in common is ongoing feedback, said Shute, who has created instructional games as well as studied their impact on learning. In gaming, feedback is constant and challenges are adjusted to maintain players' interest.

Assessment in a digital context allows researchers to use alternative approaches to measure how a student is learning over time, including the steps taken toward mastering a subject or skill. This approach gives teachers more insight into how students learn than a test, which is a snapshot in time.

Through their ability to create simulated worlds, games can also help teach young people systems thinking, which emphasizes the ability to understand the systems underlying complex problems such as global warming, Shute said.

"Nothing in the world is linear, rather everything you can think of comprises a system," Shute said, explaining why systems thinking is important. Games that require students to solve complex social problems lay the groundwork for them to develop 21st-century skills, she added. In addition to systems thinking, she said those skills include teamwork, creative problem solving, and time management.

Gee said learning these skills will require not just school reform but also education reform. "I would argue that Americans and residents of any developing country need to think of education as not just schools but a system of 24-7 learning."