Mobile Games: Endless Immersion with Young Gamers
I wasn't fully aware of the extent to which mobile games had been seeking to monopolize the free time of children until I was standing in the lobby of a Korean academy ready to start my first shift as an ESL instructor. Jet-lagged and beginning my first adventure abroad, I was a bystander as my new students entered the academy. Each one entered with the same composure: smartphone held in both hands horizontally, head down and incredibly focused on the screen. If the academy owners were lucky, they'd get a bow and a greeting from these students. There would be a degree of interaction between students, but it all seemed secondary to the main task at hand; whatever was on those screens. "Smartphones" by Alberto Mari is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0 Naturally, I assumed they were glued to YouTube - it's what I would do. Cut to my first few classes. I'm shadowing two American women who've been doi...