serious games for learning

Citizen Science is a great game to send kids home with after a science lesson on lakes and being environmentally conscious.  It would be most effective with older children in an environmental science class who are ESL students.  I have personally played it about 4 times and found great information from it. Objectives of this game can be learning how to choose appropriate topics to make good arguments as you have to be able to convince people not to do things or to do things by using information you have been collecting through out the experience.  Its also a good way to get kids to learn vocabulary.  A great way to assess this would be to have kids write down any words they come across that they do not understand and find a definition for it that way they are learning on their own and you can see that they are playing the game as well as giving them guidance when they need it by seeing what they are bringing in to class the following day.

Their are other games to promote learning on the site games for change that can help students learn on their own to reenforce knowledge learned in class.  These games incloude games on poverty, the environment, and economics, to name a few and can be classified by age groups to see what is most appropriate for your class.