DragonBox is an innovative new learning algebra game from Norway developed by WeWanttoKnow, currently available for OS X, Windows, Android, IPad, and IPhone. Akin to a mathematical Mr. Miyagi, this app has students performing what seems like tasks wholly unrelated to the learning of mathematics. Unlike Mr. Miyagi, these tasks could be mistaken for fun and games as opposed to chores. Its main target market is algebra students ages twelve to seventeen, but is touted to be accessible and enjoyable to learners and gamers of all ages. This reviewer can confirm, it does live up to the hype!
DragonBox manages to get all the necessary techniques conveyed for solving equations without uttering so much as a word. All the mechanics are demonstrated through a quick visual suggestion. This is followed by the student executing the same action they just witnessed. Everything else is trained through the student attempting to accomplish the game's main task: to get the dragon's box all by itself. Of course... the box is secretly the variable x and the tomatoes and bugs it gobbles up are secretly constants. So what looks like a silly game is teaching an assortment of mathematics principles. Extra stars are offered for fully simplifying the dragon food and being efficient, adding a reason for the student to go back and refine their skills from earlier lesson. Your dragon starts out as a hatchling, but feed it enough algebraic food and both you and your dragon will grow into a ferocious number crunching beast!
As you progress through the game, its true intentions are slowly revealed. Initially we see that when a dark colored animal is combined with a light colored animal of the same type it becomes a vortex. In later chapters of the game, these dark and light colored animals become black and white dice that cancel out when added together. After considerable progression, these are replaced with the symbols -a and a or -5 and 5 that add together to form a 0 symbol instead of a vortex. Bubbles around the animals are later replaced with parentheses. These and many other transitions are sprinkled throughout, often only temporarily, in a way that eases the student into playing the game with rigorous mathematical notation. A few new mathematical properties or operations are introduced near the start of the game's ten chapters. Each of the new operations (called 'powers' in-game) build on each other, causing the problems to go from very basic procedures to intricate and involved puzzle solving for the gamer to appreciate.
Like Mr. Miyagi's style of teaching, the student performs actions that have one meaning in their initial context, that we later learn has an entirely different meaning in another context. Just as the wax on, wax off turned out to be a circle block in the context of sparring... combining dark and light colored animals to generate a vortex translates into competence with the additive inverse property. As these tasks become more complex, the game takes student beyond mere rote manipulations and to the level of strategy and goal oriented procedural tasks. A large part of developing competence in the game's strategy is Looking for and making use of structure, the seventh common core standard for algebra. However, this shouldn't be mistaken as a program that enjoys the benefits of math modeling or even one that will give students an understanding of what all this symbol manipulation is really doing. Using this program, a student could easily learn how to simplify and manipulate complicated fractions, but don't expect them to understand what makes six divided by six equal to one if they didn't understand it prior to playing this game. The game simply doesn't address mathematical properties. Division is never defined. All we really appear to have is a line that causes 'like animals' to cancel out to a one when the bottom animal crosses over it. That being said the game does a good job at hammering home the constraints, relationship, and goals of early algebraic manipulation. Therefore, this game should contribute tremendously a students perseverance and ability to make sense of problems, the first common core standard for algebra.
Don't mistake this for the answer to all your pedagogy needs. For example, this game does not convey much of the reasoning behind algebraic manipulation, despite giving the interested student relative master over it. Therefore, by itself it only satisfies half of the second common core standard for algebra, Reason abstractly and quantitively. For students to be able to translate this knowledge into quantitative reasoning or modeling, supplemental materials would be required. WeWanttoKnow provides some resources for teacher who wish to have a lesson plan outline that matches closely with the concepts they learn in the game, which can be found here: (http://wewanttoknow.com/resources/DragonBox/Rules_algebra.pdf) These resources contribute to the sixth common core algebra standard, Attend to precision. These materials discuss the properties that the game is demonstrating to you. For example, the materials explain how when dark and light colors create a vortex, it is tacitly demonstrating the additive identity property.
As you progress through the game, its true intentions are slowly revealed. Initially we see that when a dark colored animal is combined with a light colored animal of the same type it becomes a vortex. In later chapters of the game, these dark and light colored animals become black and white dice that cancel out when added together. After considerable progression, these are replaced with the symbols -a and a or -5 and 5 that add together to form a 0 symbol instead of a vortex. Bubbles around the animals are later replaced with parentheses. These and many other transitions are sprinkled throughout, often only temporarily, in a way that eases the student into playing the game with rigorous mathematical notation. A few new mathematical properties or operations are introduced near the start of the game's ten chapters. Each of the new operations (called 'powers' in-game) build on each other, causing the problems to go from very basic procedures to intricate and involved puzzle solving for the gamer to appreciate.
Like Mr. Miyagi's style of teaching, the student performs actions that have one meaning in their initial context, that we later learn has an entirely different meaning in another context. Just as the wax on, wax off turned out to be a circle block in the context of sparring... combining dark and light colored animals to generate a vortex translates into competence with the additive inverse property. As these tasks become more complex, the game takes student beyond mere rote manipulations and to the level of strategy and goal oriented procedural tasks. A large part of developing competence in the game's strategy is Looking for and making use of structure, the seventh common core standard for algebra. However, this shouldn't be mistaken as a program that enjoys the benefits of math modeling or even one that will give students an understanding of what all this symbol manipulation is really doing. Using this program, a student could easily learn how to simplify and manipulate complicated fractions, but don't expect them to understand what makes six divided by six equal to one if they didn't understand it prior to playing this game. The game simply doesn't address mathematical properties. Division is never defined. All we really appear to have is a line that causes 'like animals' to cancel out to a one when the bottom animal crosses over it. That being said the game does a good job at hammering home the constraints, relationship, and goals of early algebraic manipulation. Therefore, this game should contribute tremendously a students perseverance and ability to make sense of problems, the first common core standard for algebra.
Don't mistake this for the answer to all your pedagogy needs. For example, this game does not convey much of the reasoning behind algebraic manipulation, despite giving the interested student relative master over it. Therefore, by itself it only satisfies half of the second common core standard for algebra, Reason abstractly and quantitively. For students to be able to translate this knowledge into quantitative reasoning or modeling, supplemental materials would be required. WeWanttoKnow provides some resources for teacher who wish to have a lesson plan outline that matches closely with the concepts they learn in the game, which can be found here: (http://wewanttoknow.com/resources/DragonBox/Rules_algebra.pdf) These resources contribute to the sixth common core algebra standard, Attend to precision. These materials discuss the properties that the game is demonstrating to you. For example, the materials explain how when dark and light colors create a vortex, it is tacitly demonstrating the additive identity property.
DragonBox is a new game that harkens back to the design of early video games. You learned to play Mario and Galaga through a series of ever more complicated sets of tasks and procedures as opposed to the listening to lengthy expositions and manuals of modern day video games. Therefore, this game doesn't require the teacher to introduce some sort of introductory task. True, there are a great variety of practice problems to tackle learn as you go, but DragonBox relies on a system that is not completely intuitive without some gradual build up. Therefore, a planned activity for this application is not necessary, since most students will have to start from first chapter of the game to learn the basics anyway.
DragonBox is a spectacular spin on the education game genre, and stands in its own right among gems such as Bookworm Adventures, Puzzle Pirates, and Crayon Physics Deluxe. The program is perfect for giving students a solid introduction into the strategic world of algebraic manipulation. When supplemented with WeWanttoKnow's teacher materials and some additional resources on quantitative reasoning, your students will be on their way to being fantastic amateur algebraists. If you're looking for a great way to spice up an algebra classroom or are just looking to brush up on some computation skills that have long gathered dust, then this app is for you!
DragonBox is a spectacular spin on the education game genre, and stands in its own right among gems such as Bookworm Adventures, Puzzle Pirates, and Crayon Physics Deluxe. The program is perfect for giving students a solid introduction into the strategic world of algebraic manipulation. When supplemented with WeWanttoKnow's teacher materials and some additional resources on quantitative reasoning, your students will be on their way to being fantastic amateur algebraists. If you're looking for a great way to spice up an algebra classroom or are just looking to brush up on some computation skills that have long gathered dust, then this app is for you!