DLD 2012: Atari Founder Details New Education Initiative

Nolan Bushnell, founder of Atari and Chuck E. Cheese’s, has a new pet project that aims straight for the classroom. At the Digital Life Design conference yesterday, Bushnell outlined his plans f...
DLD 2012: Atari Founder Details New Education Initiative
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  • Nolan Bushnell, founder of Atari and Chuck E. Cheese’s, has a new pet project that aims straight for the classroom.

    At the Digital Life Design conference yesterday, Bushnell outlined his plans for Speed to Learn according to the DLD tumblr. The new service aims at updating the classroom for modern students to learn in new ways.

    “ADHD is misspelled – it’s actually called boring teacher syndrome,” Bushnell said.

    He went on to say that the traditional system is not up to date on the kind of learning processes that are needed to keep students engaged.

    At this point, he says that the education system can learn from video games. He says that the classrooms should be rid of lectures and homework, and introduce individual learning styles. He went on to say that the classroom should in incorporate notions of different learning cultures, and add the power of computers. Such a move would create an education revolution he said.

    The Speed to Learn initiative aims to do that. Teachers can not handle the difficult levels of students, but computers can. He says that through using software that mimics the structures of computer games, initiatives like Speed to Learn can speed up the education process and help individual students reach their potential.

    “Matching difficulty with ability makes teaching fun,” Bushnell said.

    Here are some more priceless quotes from the talk with Bushnell:

    “The Classroom is the Dumbest Thing Ever Invented For Teaching Children” Nolan Bushnell, Founder of Atari / Pong @ #DLD12 1 day ago via TweetDeck · powered by @socialditto

    Bushnell: “Matching difficulty levels with ability can help keep students motivated” #DLD12 #DLDLearn 1 day ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    “I characterize my life on how much fun I have.” Nolan Bushnell, father of 8 and inventor of pong w/120 billion lifetime downloads #DLD12 1 day ago via Twitter for iPad · powered by @socialditto

    Nolan Bushnell: Todays school system is outdated. One week of teaching could be learned in ONE hour #DLD12 1 day ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    [Lead image courtesy of DLD tumblr]

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