Chapter 1 Literacy as a Game and its Players

Abstract

The skills that Brandon deployed during the geography game are also skills that help him achieve success in school. These skills include (a) the emotional sensitivity to discern the will of the class in continuing to play, (b) an awareness of what he would have to do to prolong the game, (c) the social sophistication to decide who he wanted to move to his new team, (d) the ability to notice and capitalize on the decision-making processes of others, and, of course, (e) geographic knowledge. These skills are potentially valuable in contexts outside of the community and it is likely that he learned and practiced them there. I observed these skills through his story. Although the list of them is long and impressive, the fact that he was able to alchemize them in the context of school for a purpose he set himself is what made me awestruck.

Citation

Rice, M. (2011), "Chapter 1 Literacy as a Game and its Players", Rice, M. (Ed.) Adolescent Boys' Literate Identity (Advances in Research on Teaching, Vol. 15), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 1-13. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1479-3687(2011)0000015007