title: Special issue: Experience and benefits of game playing

authors: Lorentz, Pascaline

abstract: This special issue of Cyberpsychology entitled “The Experience and Benefits of Game Playing” reflects the efforts of a range of European, American and Australian researchers who place the experience of playing video games at the core of their reflective work. Studies on video gaming can be differentiated on the basis of the extent to which the research positions games at the heart of their work, in addition to the extent to which research gives attention to the capacities and thinking of the game player to be able to offer perspectives on player experience. This approach to research is evident in all articles included in this special issue.

The special edition also sought to widen the research disciplines that could submit research in order to reflect how games currently constitutes an object of study for a wide range of disciplines—including (but not limited to) psychology, media studies, sociology, philosophy, and computer and organizational sciences. The intent was to present research with cross-disciplinary relevance to suggest the kinds of connections that can be made across a wider body of literature with a broader range of research interests reflecting an expansive range of video game texts.

text: Special issue: Experience and benefits of game playing This special issue of Cyberpsychology entitled “The Experience and Benefits of Game Playing” reflects the efforts of a range of European, American and Australian researchers who place the experience of playing video games at the core of their reflective work. Studies on video gaming can be differentiated on the basis of the extent to which the research positions games at the heart of their work, in addition to the extent to which research gives attention to the capacities and thinking of the game player to be able to offer perspectives on player experience. This approach to research is evident in all articles included in this special issue.

The special edition also sought to widen the research disciplines that could submit research in order to reflect how games currently constitutes an object of study for a wide range of disciplines—including (but not limited to) psychology, media studies, sociology, philosophy, and computer and organizational sciences. The intent was to present research with cross-disciplinary relevance to suggest the kinds of connections that can be made across a wider body of literature with a broader range of research interests reflecting an expansive range of video game texts.

year: 2015

title: Teacher change in a developing curriculum area: the example of trade teachers in the New Zealand technology curriculum

authors: Jones, Alister

abstract: Technology education for all students is a relatively new phenomenon in national and international curricula. Although New Zealand has a long history of technical education in the senior primary and secondary school, a curriculum for technology education for all students has only recently been introduced. Aspects of technology have been included in many existing school programmes, but these have not been presented and undertaken in a coherent way. Technology as it developed in past curricula encompassed a limited range of skills, processes and knowledge. The general aims of technology education in Technology in the New Zealand Curriculum (Ministry of Education, 1995) are to develop  technological knowledge and understanding, an understanding and awareness of the interrelationship between technology and society, and technological capability  in a number of technological areas. This paper will report on the changes that a group of traditional technical teachers have been required to undergo and the way in which these teachers have, or have not, been successful in adapting to a new technology curriculum. The influences on this particular group will be explored, as well as the factors that have led to some of these teachers adopting the technology.

text: Teacher change in a developing curriculum area: the example of trade teachers in the New Zealand technology curriculum Technology education for all students is a relatively new phenomenon in national and international curricula. Although New Zealand has a long history of technical education in the senior primary and secondary school, a curriculum for technology education for all students has only recently been introduced. Aspects of technology have been included in many existing school programmes, but these have not been presented and undertaken in a coherent way. Technology as it developed in past curricula encompassed a limited range of skills, processes and knowledge. The general aims of technology education in Technology in the New Zealand Curriculum (Ministry of Education, 1995) are to develop  technological knowledge and understanding, an understanding and awareness of the interrelationship between technology and society, and technological capability  in a number of technological areas. This paper will report on the changes that a group of traditional technical teachers have been required to undergo and the way in which these teachers have, or have not, been successful in adapting to a new technology curriculum. The influences on this particular group will be explored, as well as the factors that have led to some of these teachers adopting the technology.

year: 2000

title: Maori land in Hauraki

authors: Hart, Philip

abstract: Imagining the Hauraki Peninsula to contain payable goldfields and knowing that land to the south of Thames had great agricultural potential, Pakeha were determined to acquire it, and were frustrated by what was considered to be ‘Maori intransigence’. For their part, Maori landowners were justifiably concerned about losing their land, and hindered and delayed opening it to settlement for as long as possible. A major difficulty for officials seeking to acquire land was how to determine boundaries between different blocks and how to identify the true owners when there were rival claims put forward by hapu and individuals. Land purchase agents used a variety of means to get blocks through the land court and then to individualize the title, notably the controversial ‘raihana’ policy, which benefited some landowners at the expense of others. The expensive legal process involved often forced those who had proved their ownership to sell land to pay for their success, a success which resulted in grantees treating the land as their personal property rather than tribal property. Some Pakeha as well as many Maori protested at the unfair process; even James Mackay, the most effective practitioner of raihana, came to lament his success and its consequences for the younger generation of Maori (he blamed the system, not himself). When far too late, it was urged that land should have been leased rather than sold and that proceeds from sales should not have been squandered.
Instead of having commissions of enquiry, as some suggested, the land court system meant that judges determined ownership on the evidence presented to them, even though some owners were not present nor had their interests represented. Sometimes the evidence was false, as was admitted by some witnesses when their perjury was exposed. And in the case of the Ohinemuri district, for which the records survive, when the land was sold to the Crown some Maori received too much money, some too little, and some missed out altogether. The struggles to open Ohinemuri to miners and settlers is examined in detail, revealing that some rangatira expected economic gain and that Te Hira’s party, who opposed the opening, were undermined by some of Te Hira’s followers: being ‘Hauhau’, they refused to take money from the Crown but instead took raihana, meaning goods which were charged against their land in a way they did not understand. Nor did anyone fully understand the system apart from Mackay, whose policy was eventually repudiated by the politicians who had encouraged it previously. Not all land was lost, but because the government did not assist landowners with advice and finance until well into the twentieth century what land that was retained could not be developed adequately.

text: Maori land in Hauraki Imagining the Hauraki Peninsula to contain payable goldfields and knowing that land to the south of Thames had great agricultural potential, Pakeha were determined to acquire it, and were frustrated by what was considered to be ‘Maori intransigence’. For their part, Maori landowners were justifiably concerned about losing their land, and hindered and delayed opening it to settlement for as long as possible. A major difficulty for officials seeking to acquire land was how to determine boundaries between different blocks and how to identify the true owners when there were rival claims put forward by hapu and individuals. Land purchase agents used a variety of means to get blocks through the land court and then to individualize the title, notably the controversial ‘raihana’ policy, which benefited some landowners at the expense of others. The expensive legal process involved often forced those who had proved their ownership to sell land to pay for their success, a success which resulted in grantees treating the land as their personal property rather than tribal property. Some Pakeha as well as many Maori protested at the unfair process; even James Mackay, the most effective practitioner of raihana, came to lament his success and its consequences for the younger generation of Maori (he blamed the system, not himself). When far too late, it was urged that land should have been leased rather than sold and that proceeds from sales should not have been squandered.
Instead of having commissions of enquiry, as some suggested, the land court system meant that judges determined ownership on the evidence presented to them, even though some owners were not present nor had their interests represented. Sometimes the evidence was false, as was admitted by some witnesses when their perjury was exposed. And in the case of the Ohinemuri district, for which the records survive, when the land was sold to the Crown some Maori received too much money, some too little, and some missed out altogether. The struggles to open Ohinemuri to miners and settlers is examined in detail, revealing that some rangatira expected economic gain and that Te Hira’s party, who opposed the opening, were undermined by some of Te Hira’s followers: being ‘Hauhau’, they refused to take money from the Crown but instead took raihana, meaning goods which were charged against their land in a way they did not understand. Nor did anyone fully understand the system apart from Mackay, whose policy was eventually repudiated by the politicians who had encouraged it previously. Not all land was lost, but because the government did not assist landowners with advice and finance until well into the twentieth century what land that was retained could not be developed adequately.

year: 2016