Gone are the days when we used to study by photocopying the notes from the front benchers! Now Microsoft has decided to bring all the gamers back to the classroom by foraying into the education market in India. They have partnered with Educomp to come up with educational content for the Xbox 360 platform.
Subjects like Maths, Social Studies and Science will be made available. All this will be based on the CBSE/ICSE curriculum. Microsoft claims that the content will be creatively designed by teachers, subject matter experts and innovative designers. In fact, they state that the advanced graphical capabilities and ease of use of the Xbox 360 platform will make it easy and fun for students who will get their first taste of edutainment
Mohit Anand, Country Manager, Entertainment and Devices Division, Microsoft India comments, “The association with Educomp is to bring to life the fact that interactive entertainment can be leveraged for educational purposes. The Xbox 360 is an interactive entertainment device for the whole family with which one can enjoy both music and movies. The Xbox 360 is the first next generation console to launch in India since its launch in September 2006 took gaming to new levels in India. It is our commitment to the Indian market to constantly bring the best advantages of the Xbox 360 to our consumers – maximizing the potential of the product. On the occasion of our first anniversary in India, we re-iterate our commitment to this market through the Educomp initiative. For the first time in India; the Xbox 360 will be leverage as an educational tool to facilitate learning amongst students. We are confident that the interactivity, visual appeal and graphics of credible education content based on the CBSE, ICSE curriculum, to be provided on the Xbox 360 console will enable kids to enjoy learning as never before.”
Shantanu Prakash is the Managing Director of Educomp Solutions. He said, “We are extremely excited about the prospect of curriculum content being available exclusively on the Xbox 360 platform. At Educomp, our effort has always been to take drudgery out of learning and make it a creative and entertaining process for children. The combination of a platform like Xbox 360 and rich 3D curriculum content that we will develop will change the way children approach learning at home.”
He later said, “It is an undeniable fact that gaming has become a passion among children today and they spend a lot of time, when out of school, playing games. Also, gaming allows them access to sophisticated graphics and rich 3D images and in stark comparison studies seem boring and single dimensional. This new initiative will allow children to make a smooth transition from entertainment to edutainment. We expect this initiative to bring education content on an interactive platform to be a hit among parents as well who will be happy to see their kids learning on the Xbox. It will also allow for freedom from rote learning for a vast majority of students. Research world over has shown that students learn best with a multi-sensory approach.”
The edutainment product for the Xbox 360 is being developed by Lakshya Digital in Gurgaon. Microsoft is planning to launch the product by December 2007 and has said that it will be affordably priced.
Such edutainment products are available for the PC and they too are not faring well. It seems unlikely that the product will be a hit amongst the users of Xbox 360 either, considering the fact that there are far more PCs in India than Xbox 360 consoles.