Kids to Think” Today’s society is pretty much a virtual world. Everything is done through technology—the important things like email, paying bills, and even school. In “Games, Not Schools Are Teaching Kids to Think”, James Paul argues how video games are teaching kids to think and school is not. Throughout the essay, Paul uses his knowledge and research in sociolinguistics to activate the reader’s feelings in hopes of getting them to recognize that video games are enhancing and teaching skills that the school system is not. Paul begins his essay by asking a question. He asks why kids are not learning, even though the United States spends about fifty billion dollars each year on education. (651) He then proclaims that the school system has …show more content…
He is most known for involvement in literacy research and New Literacy Studies. He has numerous books that argue and relate to the fact that video games can enhance the way kids think and also their skills. One of the books is titled What Video Games Have to Teach Us about Learning and Literacy, this book focuses on the learning principles in video games and how these principles can be useful to the K-12 classroom. It also explores relationships between values, identity, content and learning, and focuses on how to understand and explain many young people 's different experiences of learning in gaming and schooling individually. Paul’s purpose for writing this argument is to somehow persuade people that not all video games are not made to be bad or violent, but perhaps to increase children learning skills. Four years ago, an article was posted by ABC News discussing the benefits of videogames. The article revealed that videogames improve social skills, multitasking and they build cooperation, confidence and …show more content…
He did a remarkable job convincing the audience through his intelligence, concern, and logical appeals. The essay included strong reasons and statistics to uphold his argument. In most occasions, I tend to agree with Paul’s side of the argument. He says that good video games are teaching kids to think so, with the proper techniques and teaching methods I believe video games could actually be used in classrooms to help kids pay attention more effectively. This could lead to higher success rates and overall