http://3rdworldfarmer.com/
I chose the game called 3rd World Farmer which can guide us to experience the real life of the peasant in the third world. At first, I treated it as a game and I thought the more crops (corn, wheat, cotton, peanut) I planted, the more money I would get. Unfortunately, I met with many hardships, and the whole family were died in the end. The second time I played the game, I paid attention to some other details, and I found that so many hardships that the peasant had to suffer, such as the corrupt officials, the weather disasters, the unstable market, and other unexceptional problems. I played this game for four times and only one time the whole family were alive and two children had access to school. In other three times, they could not go to school and hospital for lack of money. What’s worse, their farm would be occupied by the chemistry factory. I was totally shocked when I finished the game. This game provoke people to think about the tough life of people in the third world and the real topics happened in the game, thus, taking action to help people there. The reason why I chose this game is that I hope more people can realize this situation and more people can join in.
I chose the game called 3rd World Farmer which can guide us to experience the real life of the peasant in the third world. At first, I treated it as a game and I thought the more crops (corn, wheat, cotton, peanut) I planted, the more money I would get. Unfortunately, I met with many hardships, and the whole family were died in the end. The second time I played the game, I paid attention to some other details, and I found that so many hardships that the peasant had to suffer, such as the corrupt officials, the weather disasters, the unstable market, and other unexceptional problems. I played this game for four times and only one time the whole family were alive and two children had access to school. In other three times, they could not go to school and hospital for lack of money. What’s worse, their farm would be occupied by the chemistry factory. I was totally shocked when I finished the game. This game provoke people to think about the tough life of people in the third world and the real topics happened in the game, thus, taking action to help people there. The reason why I chose this game is that I hope more people can realize this situation and more people can join in.
The game is not precise in all details, but
shows us a lot of topics I mentioned above. The students should be at Level 4 speaking skills in the class. Michigan English Language Proficiency Standards describes their ability like this: "S.4.4.a Exchange, support and discuss opinions and individual opinions and individual perspectives with peers on a variety of topics dealing with content area information or issues". The objective of the class is to teach students
express opinions on certain topics. When they play the game, ask them pay
attention to the topics that affect the income of the farmers. After they
finish the game, we can hold the activities to access students by asking them
describe their personal opinions of the topics and the consequence of the game
(e.g.: what do you think of the Farming License? Is it fair for government to
charge extra money?). Moreover, we can discuss the topics and find the solution
to this situation (e.g.: which one do you think is more important, education or
health insurance? How can we help more people go to school?). In addition , we can give students a certain and ask them to write a composition to express their opinions.
I think that this type of game will provide a lot of vocabulary for discussing the issues you mention. Since there is no oral component to the game, it would be good to review the pronunciation of the necessary vocabulary before attempting discussions.
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