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In my ongoing quest to locate the pedagogical value of games (via game play, research and dialogue), I have come across an interesting example of situated learning in WoW: The random dungeon, or “PUG.”

For those of you unfamiliar with the term, here is an excellent and educator friendly overview.

“A PUG is a “pick-up-group,” or an informal group of players who don’t already know each other, who are working together on a quest or an instance. PUGs can teach you A LOT about how to play your class and how to interact with others in the game. To be a good pugger, you should know a bit about PUG ettiquette and also a little something about the different roles you might be expected to play in a group.”

Rather than duplicating this description above, I’d like to talk about some of my own, personal, observations and experiences in PUGS and why I think they have value as a form of (radical) gaming-focused PD for educators. Yes, this post is about our / your learning – not that of our students. And when it comes to gaming and education, I feel that it’s educators – not students – who are most in need of emergent “literacy.”

And before I say anything further, the first and foremost reason you should explore PUGs? they’re F-U-N.

1. Getting out of our comfort zones

Most learning involves stepping out of our comfort zones. As educators, it seems it’s often easier to perpetually delegate our way around learning to those who are ‘already interested in’ the task at hand than dive into discomfort.

There are a lot of “not nice” things in live gaming that you wouldn’t be exposed to in a scripted console game. This was one of my reasons for not wanting to explore WOW. Thing is, the internet is a place with a lot of not so nice things in it as well – did you let that stop you from using it? As with blogs, Twitter, social media, MMOs and any other space where you’re going to encounter any sort of social “randomness” you’re going to take a risk of finding something unexpected. And it may not always be very nice. If you’re a classroom teacher, then you’re already engaging that kind of exchange on a daily basis.  Going to, as Buddhist nun Pema Chodron says, “the places that scare you“, is part of the journey  – of life and learning.

2. Situated Learning

Situated learning is, at its simplest, informal learning that occurs through an activity that is essentially self directed and contextual. It’s most of the learning we’ve been doing since we were born.

Every day, in some form, you are going to receive learning from a stranger. Whether it’s somebody in a social network or the woman on the bus who gave you directions. Sometimes this learning doesn’t come in a productive form – like the cyclist who flipped you the bird for talking on your cell phone instead of watching the road. While you may not have appreciated the form that lesson took, but the import was critical. And this is where authentic situated learning differs from carefully structured, “skooly” and productive learning experiences produced within institutional spaces. This kind of learning hasn’t been cleaned up for us. It’s raw and unprocessed.

Random Dungeons – or PUGS – are a form of situated learning. They are contextual, random, instant and mostly self directed. Players, though similar in level, are brought together randomly and for a very short time to complete a dungeon. You have never met and you will have no more than a few seconds to exchange any information before you begin, but you will work as a team to complete your objective. All you are expected to know is how to play your character’s class (your spell rotation, your gear and your role within a team is your own self directed task). And though the experiences can range from good, bad to ugly, the learning benefit of pugs far outweighs the occasional discomfort of a bad group.

In WOW, you come across the requisite knowledge you’ll need for a dungeon as you progress through the game and via your guild or out-of-game research of user contributed forums. But it isn’t until you team with other players that you begin to appreciate how much or how little you have learned. In this, PUGs are also a form of vital informal performance assessment (though it can sometimes be rather harsh!). If you are with a “good” group, the advice or critique will take a more productive form (i.e., “great work but you’re taking a lot of damage. you might want to get new gear” v. “lol your gear sucks!”). Personally, I’d rather get to raiding (the wow endgame) with other guildies who have done a lot of randoms (and learned how to be effective teammates) than with those who have quested their way up through the ranks without ever having to be tested (or challenged) in a random context.

3. Smack talk (and other ugly things we’d rather avoid but need to learn about)

As you may know, I’m not into aggressive, macho culture. I find most of it pretty disturbing. So why am I playing wow? Well, for one thing, I’m an explorer. Within reason, if I don’t understand something I’m likely not going to learn much about it by avoiding it. This doesn’t mean I explore everything that makes me uneasy but that there are many opportunities for exploration that, though uncomfortable, will not involve engaging in anything harmful. The (sometimes ugly <– warning: NSFW offensive/inequitable language) forms of communication that take place in these game spaces is an example of fairly harmless, but disconcerting, learnings I’ve engaged in this game. Whether they are elitist jerks or garden variety smack talkers, their objective is the same: belittle and deride.

Far from justifying this highly unproductive (and offensive) communication, I would argue that it is a form of role playing. And for many players, the objective of smack talk is tactical (however misguided, meanspirited or adolescent). This expression can range from subtle jabs to all out insults that can be highly inequitable and offensive (i.e., often sexist, homophobic and/or racist in content). I could write a whole critique of this aspect of the game and how we can and should critique it (with our students) and I will. For the teacher planning on using these games with students, random game play presents a great opportunity for inquiry – particularly around social sciences (gender, bullying, homophobia, sexism, racism and other embedded issues).

Though you cannot control what other players do or say, you can control your own response, lack of response or actions towards them. One of the virtues of the game is that you can “kick” players from a group who start to engage in abuse. You can also simply choose to leave. Or, you can creatively defy it (I’ll talk about this at the end of the post). I’d say only a small percentage of my experiences in pugs could be described as abusive. For the most part, criticisms are usually fairly innocuous and, quite often, earned (i.e,. you went afk and caused the group to wipe – or else you aggrod to often).

Teachers, especially, can benefit from observing these kinds of exchanges and social cultures that are very far from our equitable comfort zones. In some cases, we may conclude – quite correctly – that we are visitors inhabiting a space with very different codes and rules than the ones we support or engage. While I may highly object to the specific terms used to describe a particular action (i.e., if a dragon kills a player and they will often say it “raped” them — i prefer pwn :), I begin to translate their chosen communication to see the essential thing they’re trying to communicate (i.e., I didn’t have a chance with that dragon”). It may be ugly, but it is a highly coded form of language between players that communicates one’s belonging to this culture.

4. Cultivating collaboration

Given some of the negative aspects I mentioned above, one of the most valuable reasons to take part in PUGS is to cultivate the kind of game play you believe in. For me, that’s about contributing positive and productive comments (teaching others around me what that sound and looks like) and defaulting to shared – rather than targeted – humour. For example, cultivating a context in which the player who wiped us gets another chance. I recently found myself in a PUG with three players all in the same family. They had entered as a group (something you can do) and offered nothing but fun and support throughout (it was my first time through the dungeon). Not only did I get xp and a fast, efficient run through the dungeon but I was with some really genuinely nice players who invited me to join them for another dungeon right afterwards. It was a fun hour and a half of game play for all. Last night, I ran a pug in a new dungeon. We all got killed by a dragon. Our dungeon master said: two of you weren’t jumping. So I said, “but I was trying to cast. I need to stay still while casting.” Instead of insulting me for not knowing how to stay alive, he said “jump, jump, cast. Jump, jump, cast” – so I did. And I lived. And we slayed the dragon. And now I know how to do that particular instance thanks to a good, random, teacher. Goodbye stranger, and thanks for the lesson.

And I guess as a progressive person, being a change agent also extends to my game play. If I want to see less sexist, macho, inequitable game play then I am going to have to get in there and help create that. If not, who will? And that is my challenge to you.

Further Reading:

WoW.com: Pro Tips for Lowbie dungeon runners

Here are a few more reasons why educators should explore WoW …