I've been spending a lot of time lately thinking about how to harness Wizard 101 to my sons' homeschooling curriculum. Both adore the game, and are powerfully motivated to earn in-game items and crowns for various tasks.
I've worked out a math lesson for my 4th grader. The lesson requires use of a calculator and/or spreadsheet, use of a Wizard101 Central wiki, and access to Wizard 101.
Here's our first of (hopefully) many wizard math lessons:
How high can Efreet hit?
1) Research the available blades, traps, and other enchantments that will boost Efreet.
2) Make a list of each type of boost and note how each one can be gained: library, bazaar, gardening, crafting, pet, gear, etc.
3) Collect, buy, and/or grow and/or craft those items.
4) Make another list of each blade, trap, and other enchantment discovered in the research and note the amount of boost it will will deliver.
5) Add up all of the percentages to determine the total boost to Efreet.
6) Multiply to get the numeric value of the total percentage of boost.
7) Divide to determine how much the total boost will effect the base damage of the Efreet spell.
8 ) Double the damage to get a critical hit total, just in case.
9) Test the math in Unicorn Way and take a screen shot of the total damage delivered. (proof is always good)
10) Check the math against the paper calculation. Was it the same? Different? If different, why? Correct the paper math.
11) Repeat until the numbers match :-)
12) Earn the Lifeforce Blade as a reward for doing some pretty complicated wizard math!
PS: I know that many, many people have done this sort of activity for the sheer fun of it. This is just one way to get a kid interested in math in the context of a game he adores :-)
I would love to hear from other parents who have used Wizard101 as a learning tool! Share and share alike :-)
My other son is currently practicing reading a book so that he may earn a Jade Oni pet. Pretty nice reward for proving his reading acquisition, me thinks.
I just showed my brother ratios by figuring out what chance you have at winning the state lottery. 1 in 18 billion. So i'm sure learning from wizard101 is much less depressing than finding out our chance at winning the lotto lol.
For Language Arts, you could give a riddle that gives clues to a non-player character that ties in to a book. For example H.G. Wags in Marleybone, or Dorthy in Unicorn Way for a younger player. Once they find the character, they take a screen shot, then show the screenshot and what book it ties in too (or series, or if it's an author a few examples of books). For homework, read the book!
I have also used wizard 101 for learning. I enjoy this game as much as my children so we do have fun together. My son and I will both log on together and he has to "chat" with me. This has greatly improved his typing speed and his spelling. Words that he has trouble with he looks up in the dictionary or goes to dictionary.com to get the proper spelling, part of speech, definition, and ect. Also, he likes how Wizard has tied in some famous characters (Sherlock Bones, for example), and he will do some research on the characters.
Amazing! :D I love how you were able to put everything you need to do in order to determine the exact value of the hit. I attend a junior high school and it would be amazing if they were to start doing that! :) I like how you give your kids a lifeforce balde as a reward. I hope your math problems are successful!
Playing the game has led my son deeper into reading--after questing in GH and Wintertusk, we explored Norse and Native American myths--the role of ravens in folklore, for example, and who the Frost Giants were in Jotunheim. We read some Sherlock Holmes when doing MB, and a bit of Dante while in DS. We looked up dragon lore, and, when questing in Krok, the role of the British Empire in the Middle East, including the controversy over antiquities (like the Krokonomicon!). In Celestia, we're revisiting Verne's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. There are a lot of ways this game is educational. And I should add that, as a math-challenged person, I've improved my calculating while playing as well. So it's all good... :-)
I am not a parent, nor do my parents play, but inatead of reading a book I don't like, my parents let me do my reading on wizzy by making me turn off the volume and reading every single quest and prom and everyrthing outlook, so, I get my reading, while I get to play my favorite game! :D
My son plays the kifreegames.com, and it helps him learn the number places! When he gets his final score he's gotta tell me which number is the ones, tens, hundreds, thousands, and so on place! It works out wonderfully, and he's getting some of his 2nd grade lessons done.
I am addicted to spread sheets and statistics. I used to figure out which bosses loot was worth the most money when you compared resale on the drops from 20-30 battles -vs- the health points they had and the duration of battle to get an estimate of money-per-hour or money-per-health point that could be earned from farming them. Then of course, once I had farmed nearly every boss in the game 50 or more times, Wizard101 increased the amount of cash everything was worth to resell it in the bazaar and added a couple new worlds and I gave up, LOL. I have had days where 2 hours farming gives me 'too much' money and I get the warning that I will lose some soon if I keep selling stuff. Then I will go breed a random pet or buy treasure cards to give away. :) But there are numerous opportunites to use Wizard101 as a teaching tool. Have your kids do something like what I did and find out if you get money faster from farming Krokotopia or Marleybone, Celestia or Wintertusk. Which bosses have the highest ratio of seed drops? Reagents? Housing items? Pick 3 bosses of the same rank and see who averages the most damage against you, etc. Do you average more 'good' drops in solo or in party? Yep. Lots of brain draining potential in this game. :)
I'm in highschool and although I'm a bit too old for this kind of math and such I think it's a really good way to teach kids. Plus I think this game really helps children type and spell a whole lot better. Great idea
Thank you so much for this post. We have decided to homeschool for the first time this year. During the summer I have been having my kids earn playing time by doing school work or reading. We were just talking today about how we could use what they know from the game and explore it in books. If anyone has any ideas, as I don't play the game, I would really love to hear them. I love the math ideas! Thanks again Jessica
Just a quick hint on your max damage experiment, the order of the blades/traps matters. Hopefully the experimenting will show that it's not just a sum of all the percentages.
Great idea, except for one thing! The order blades and traps are casted has an effect on the total. for example, casting a 30% blade then a 35% blade will have a different total then say casting a 35% blade first, then a 30% blade. This is also true for traps. So the order is also very important in a math problem such as this.
One of the reasons I love Wizard101 is because of all the referances to literature. I'm a huge fan of reading, fantasies, and mythology so I love to see characters I've read about in books and learned about in class in the Spiral!
i am home schooled to! i wish i could do that instead of my math program
My son is still a bit young and really hasn't started too much on the higher math but, what we have done is he will go on his account and I will go on mine and we chat small things and I make him read it to me. It really has helped with his reading and makes it fun! :D
This is just wonderful! I use Wizard101 to help my son learning English as it's not our primary language and I can see the results already. From a 7.5 grade he came home last Month with a 9.8!
He never even asked for a reward as we are just having sooo much fun together, but the life force blade is a great suggestion!
I'm gonna make a list of study related quests for him this week, I'm sure he will love to have more to do with the game!
I've been spending a lot of time lately thinking about how to harness Wizard 101 to my sons' homeschooling curriculum. Both adore the game, and are powerfully motivated to earn in-game items and crowns for various tasks.
I've worked out a math lesson for my 4th grader. The lesson requires use of a calculator and/or spreadsheet, use of a Wizard101 Central wiki, and access to Wizard 101.
Here's our first of (hopefully) many wizard math lessons:
How high can Efreet hit?
1) Research the available blades, traps, and other enchantments that will boost Efreet.
2) Make a list of each type of boost and note how each one can be gained: library, bazaar, gardening, crafting, pet, gear, etc.
3) Collect, buy, and/or grow and/or craft those items.
4) Make another list of each blade, trap, and other enchantment discovered in the research and note the amount of boost it will will deliver.
5) Add up all of the percentages to determine the total boost to Efreet.
6) Multiply to get the numeric value of the total percentage of boost.
7) Divide to determine how much the total boost will effect the base damage of the Efreet spell.
8 ) Double the damage to get a critical hit total, just in case.
9) Test the math in Unicorn Way and take a screen shot of the total damage delivered. (proof is always good)
10) Check the math against the paper calculation. Was it the same? Different? If different, why? Correct the paper math.
11) Repeat until the numbers match :)
12) Earn the Lifeforce Blade as a reward for doing some pretty complicated wizard math!
PS: I know that many, many people have done this sort of activity for the sheer fun of it. This is just one way to get a kid interested in math in the context of a game he adores :)
I would love to hear from other parents who have used Wizard101 as a learning tool! Share and share alike :)
My other son is currently practicing reading a book so that he may earn a Jade Oni pet. Pretty nice reward for proving his reading acquisition, me thinks.
Regards from this wizarding parent,
queenlybluebean/Iridian/Rowan/Scarlet/Moira
I just adore numbers. When I play this game I set there with my calculator figuring the outcome of my damage and heal.
I have a challenged teenage (approaching 17) daughter that has begged me for open chat rather than just text chat. While I'm sure she hears everything on her school bus that she could hear online with open chat, I have not let her obtain open chat for a very significant reason - - it forces her to learn to be a better speller and typist. She has improved in these areas significantly since she started playing Wizards. She has also improved in her ability to think "outside the box" as she tries to intrepret the creative ways people talk around the filters for a variety of purposes. Fortunately she is only concerned with figuring out the good things like normal texting short cuts and numbers :-). She is offended and will report anyone who talks around the filters in a bad way (amazing how quickly they figure out it is something bad). I find many opportunities in the game to provide teaching moments to her and her younger brother. Sometimes it is socialization issues and sometimes math, spelling, and more academic concerns. Overall, I find Wizard101 to be a great game for family fun and learning.
