Läs: spela!

Abstract Svanvik, Robin (2013). Läs: spela! En jämförande studie av elevers uppfattningar om datorspel, skönlitteratur och lärande. Svanvik, Robin (2013). It Reads: Play! A comparative study of students' beliefs about computer games, fiction reading and learning. This essay is part of a masters degree of pedagogy and investigates the experiences of 10 high-school students concerning playing computer-games-off-the-shelf (COTS) on the one hand, and reading fictional, printed novels on the other. The aim of this study was to learn more about the students' thoughts about playing COTS and reading novels; also, what differences and similarities there might be between these activities. Furthermore, I wanted to know what they thought they might learn from these activities. The theoretical point of departure for the study is twofold: Firstly, a theory of learning as expressed by Illeris (2007) and, secondly, a sociocultural perspective on learning, represented by Säljö (2000, 2005/2010) which includes the educational benifit of both playing COTS, represented by Gee (2007), and reading fiction, represented by Probst (1990) and Langer (1995). The method used in this study is mainly qualitative by nature. High school students from four different classes were asked to fill in an enquiry regarding their experiences about playing of COTS and reading fiction. Ten students were chosen and gave their consent to participate in a qualitative depth interview about the topic stated above. Analysis of the material shows that by playing COTS, the students practice, interaction, cooperation and hypothesizing and the ability to make swift decisions. Furthermore, playing COTS seems to be a highly motivating activity. By reading fiction they felt that their linguistic skills improve, that they practice mind-reading or the ability of empathy, and the ability of contemplating in general. However, it turned out that that by playing certain COTS, empathy could be practised as well as linguistic skills. And by speaking about fiction also foster hypothesizing and communication. The result of this study has implications as to how teachers can organize the curriculum for English as a second language and possibly for teaching Swedish as well. Key words: Computer games, reading fiction, learning, socio-cultural perspective