Please bookmark and RSS my self-hosted blog for 2014 onwards! Dean Groom [dot] com.
I started writing this blog in 2007 and it’s grown and grown to be read by hundreds of thousands of people. That still freaks me out! – I have to thank Judy O’Connell for that. Without Judy, I’d wouldn’t be doing what I’m doing today.
If you know me, you’ll know that back in 2007 I was teaching high school computing. A lot has happened over the years — and most of that has been because of the amazing power of citizen-media — and people who create, curate and amplify it. These days I’m working with some equally amazing people at the UNSW and my PhD supers – Professor Catherine Lumby and Dr. Kate Highfield on some research with a the grand title “Negotiations of digital-play: how families discover, engage with and negotiate networked video games”.
The central aim of this project is to discover family conceptions of how video games are negotiated in Australia, particularly networked video games, and to develop theories of how families acquire critical understanding of video games as a cultural literature.
I’m still keeping the day job — despite also part-owning a growing electric bike shop — and I’m still a firm believer that all stages of formal education require media-studies programmes towards student attributes and capabilities. A decade of “ed-tech” has taught me how easy it is to tack-on, but how necessary it is to be at the core of learning either formally or informally. It’s with all this in mind, that I’ve begun to move from this blog to a self-hosted blog “Dean Groom [dot] com”. For some time, I’ll cross-post — but the focus of my blog from 2014 will be towards video-games and parenting (and being a parent involved education). You might want to subscribe to it, book mark it — or just feel relieved I’m moving on.
Some very special thanks: to Jeb at Mojang who kicked my “Why won’t she get off Minecraft?” post into the the stratosphere with a single Tweet. Then there are all those who were at ISTE 2008 — most of whom I still see kicking-ass. To my friends in St. Loius — who were so kind and generous — To Kerry, Shaph, Bron and fellow game-head-educators who were doing this well before it was ‘cool’. I’d also like to thank my very special friend Jeff and his family — who constantly inspires me (and steals my Twitter ID) — I so nearly got to live in Great Falls. Then there is Derek Robertson who’s vision for gaming in schools has always been an absolute beacon for me — and for his generosity in all things gaming.
Lastly I’d like to thank everyone who’s ever bothered to leave a comment and visit my blog!
I wish everyone a happy and safe festive season and hope you get a new bike — an Air Cooled VW, an Alfa Romeo and tickets for Comic Con on Christmas morning! And yes, there will be a lot more for parents of game-kids on the revamped blog for 2014.
Go on, leave a comment – let blogging live!
Playable 