Belgium/FOr'J, using video games as an educational tool in youth centers and schools
RTBF iXPé highlights Belgian associations working with video games. Today, FOr'J, a network of youth centers that not only uses video games as an educational tool, but also trains teachers to do the same.
Youth centers are everywhere to welcome children and teenagers, offering them a place to get together, as well as sports, cultural and educational activities. Some even use video games for this purpose, as in the case of several youth centers in the FOr'J network, based in Charleroi.
"We use it as an educational tool. In particular, we create games, which helps develop knowledge of different digital tools," cites Julien Annart, Gaming Project Manager for the non-profit organization, as an example. "We also do a lot of animations where young people will be able to discover independent games, Belgian games, but games with more varied avatars in terms of origin and gender, with the idea also of working on the citizen issues behind these themes."
FOr'J also organizes training courses for educational teams, particularly teachers, to offer them educational tools based on gaming. "The idea is to show how video games are a medium that has a place in the lives of young people, and how all forms of play can have a place in schools."
To this end, FOr'J has been working for ten years on the Educajeux videogame pedagogy manual. "In particular, it provides learning tools for the entire educational sector to work on informal and formal skills with video games, but also explains how the latter can be a subject in a media education logic," points out Julien Annart.
Source: /www.rtbf.be/article/
