August 1994 — Features

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Educational Effectiveness of Computer Software

Oregon Trail has much to offer: It requires making intelligent decisions based on several, but not all, available facts. It teaches students to collect, organize and retrieve information for interpretation. Many problem-solving situations, like river crossings, are presented. Every solution has implicit consequences that are accumulated to determine the end result of the game. The game is played in an interactive mode via menus and a few prompting questions. Explanations are provided for almost every choice through sub-menus. As one continues on the 2,400-mile trail, conditions such as weather, health, pace, rations, next landmark and miles traveled from the Missouri River to Oregon, are displayed. The more complex a program -- many different features and paths from which to choose -- the greater the chance it will appeal to a larger audience.3 Oregon Trail is fairly complex in that it has many different kinds of challenges, some of which are ignored by some children, but acted on by others. Characteristics of this game that we observed as most appealing to students include: reaching the end of the trail, scoring higher than before, making a Top-Ten list, hunting and killing animals, digging graves and successfully crossing rivers. Oregon Trail's designers have at least partly succeeded, in that children come back to the program. However, the question of whether a student has learned that which was intended is far less certain.
The primary learning objective of this game is to develop decision-making skills in the face of changing and sometimes unforeseen circumstances. One has to consider alternative solutions and consequences, arrive at conclusions and act accordingly. Another objective is to develop intellectual skills by learning to compare and classify things, ideas, events and situations on the basis of similarities and differences, and group them into categories.