The 7th annual Australian Game Developers Conference (AGDC) is to host a pre-event Schools and Computer Games Summit on 30 November 2005 to promote the use of computer games in learning.

John De Margheriti, founder of the AGDC is eager to dispel the myth that electronic games are a negative influence on learning, claiming they have, “hampered rather than harnessed their true motivational merits.”

He says, “The summit has been inspired by the proliferating number of higher and vocational education providers offering Electronic Games courses over the last few years, and we want to make right the fact that there has been no corresponding increase in games study in schools.”

Themed, “Harnessing the Future, the summit will showcase opportunities for schools to engage with computer games, and how to harness their motivational appeal.

Taking place at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, in Melbourne's Federation Square, the summit will encourage teachers, career advisors, educational leaders and academic researchers to devise their own curriculum using games that students are already likely to be familiar with.

Organisers of the AGDC have enlisted Dr Kurt Squires, assistant professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison to demonstrate how games can offer a powerful learning tool that raises the interactivity of lessons for primary and secondary school students.

Squires says, "Games make it possible to have a truly interactive educational system - where kids are asking questions, participating in complex practices, and having to prove themselves in communities of practice. With games like Civilization, we've found that students get not only more enthused about history, but deeper understandings.

"Teachers pioneering this work are using games to improve students' performance in mathematics, science, and history. Through sites like the teachersarcade.org, we hope to bring together teachers who are using games in their classrooms in order to establish models of best practice for games and learning."