Kurt Squire: "[G]ames have mostly overlooked by educational technologists because... they privilege functional knowledge over declarative knowledge."

From "Educating the Fighter: Buttonmashing, Seeing, Being" by Kurt Squire

"[G]ames have mostly overlooked by educational technologists because... they privilege functional knowledge over declarative knowledge." [36]

"Expertise in fighting games arises through a rough progression of (yet also interaction among) four phases:

(1) learning to “read” the game as a semiotic system

(2) learning, mastering, and understanding the effects of the range of } possible moves,

(3) understanding the higher order interactions among these rules and the emergent properties of the game system

(4) and a continuous monitoring and reflecting on goals and sub-goals.

"To those used to studying knowledge in formal school settings, which privi- lege declarative knowledge, such embodied, situated gaming “knowledge” may seem foreign. Whereas schools privilege declarative knowledge, (particularly definitions or verbal representations of a “correct” answer), games privilege what it is that the player can actually do. No commercial game (save, per- haps, Full Spectrum Warrior) cares whether or not the player can articulate knowledge of the game world; instead knowledge becomes embodied in per- formance, although this knowledge can be later broken out into declarative statements. [38-39]

"When we look at game playing as an activity system which includes all of the fan writing, reading, analysis, and discussion it produces, it is clear that game playing usually becomes the subject of gamers’ own critical and reflec- tive analysis." [36]