“They read our comments? They’re talking to us? Here? In Southampton?” — a student.
As part of the writing component to our video game design project, students wrote a collective letter to Gamestar Mechanic to provide user feedback and offer up suggestions for the site. Yesterday, I shared with them a video response put together by Brian and Katya, from Gamestar Mechanic, in which they went through each of the main points. My students were so excited that someone had not only read their comments but were offering a response back to them. The video is about 8 minutes long (and private, so I won’t be sharing it) and my students were rapt and attentive as they listened to Katya and Brian chat with them, via a video screencast.
It was a real case of authentic writing for authentic audience, and it reminded me again how powerful that experience can be for young writers. Here, they were making a case for improving a game design site, and their suggestions were being listened to, considered and possibly even put into action in the future.
Thank you, Gamestar, for taking the time to interact with my students, to read their writing, to be part of the learning experience outside of the site itself. I appreciate it. And so did they.
Peace (in the interaction),
Kevin