RACINE — Travis Whitt, an English language arts teacher at Park High School and its Esports general manager, grew up playing video games and has been involved with Park’s Esports program since it began three years ago.
Whitt, who is also the school’s assistant head football coach, recently received a North America Scholastic Esports Federation fellowship and plans to use it to help normalize Esports and to teach students through gaming.
Students on Park’s Esports team competitively play “Overwatch,” “League of Legends,” “Super Smash Bros.” and “Rocket League” against other high school Esports competitors.
Whitt was recently selected as a NASEF scholastic fellow, giving him the benefit of free tools, resources and instructional coaching that includes guidance on connecting play and learning for the best student outcomes.
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“He was chosen for his enthusiastic commitment to students, a willingness to try new ideas and refine learning opportunities, and the drive to connect meaningful learning to play for students,” NASEF said in a press release.
As an English teacher, Whitt has always been interested in nontraditional storytelling and the narrative merit of video games and applying those concepts in his classroom.
But as a scholastic fellow he has access to pre-packaged Esports curriculum that he can plug into existing lessons.
Whitt has already used the popular game “Among Us” to teach persuasive speech to his students, a concept he borrowed from his NASEF scholastic mentor, Angelique Gianas.
In the game, players must decide who in the group is an imposter. There are times in the game when players have to deliberate and make a decision. Whitt gave the students 30 seconds to make their claim using the “claim, evidence, reason” method and the other 30 seconds are for counterarguments.
Whitt used sentence-starters to ease the kids into it, then they did rounds when students were required to use pathos, ethos or logos to form their arguments.
“We’re making sure that they’re putting those ideas that you would just consume and maybe identify into action,” Whitt said.
Using video games in the classroom is a way to easily engage students, Whitt said, since they’re already interested in playing the games.
Through his fellowship, Whitt hopes to help his colleagues implement Esports into their curriculum in career and technical education, English and math, to better engage all the students.
“We’re thrilled to welcome Mr. Whitt to the powerful community of NASEF scholastic fellows,” said Tom Turner, chief education officer at NASEF in the press release. “By sharing ideas and working together, the fellows will collectively improve the impacts of this unique teaching platform — and local students will be the first to benefit!”
Learning from gaming
Over the past few years, Whitt said, he has seen how much students learn from gaming together.
They learn how to deal with adversity and how to win and lose graciously. The first year, kids learned how to lose without blowing up and how to win without gloating.
“It doesn’t matter if we’re playing with a ball or a controller, we’re learning the same things,” said Whitt.
They also learn how to communicate. This year’s “Overwatch” team is filled with kids who have been with the program since its beginning.
“Our captains this year are phenomenal communicators and they were not kids who, when this started, were phenomenal communicators,” Whitt said.
Kids on the team also learn how to problem-solve, something that most kids coming into high school are not great at.
“When there’s a barrier in their way, they only have so many tools to knock that barrier down,” Whitt said. “Esports has proven that we’re teaching kids how to solve those problems.”
The kids not only spend time playing the games, but work on strategies and map out positioning plans together for future games.
Whitt hopes through his fellowship to help normalize Esports so they’re viewed by everyone as legitimate competitions like football or basketball games. This year, since large gatherings aren’t allowed due to COVID-19, Park is going to be one of the first schools around to have an Esports homecoming.
Whitt also hopes to get more kids involved in gaming in a noncompetitive basis, since some kids might just want to engage with their peers and learn and play together without the time commitment of being on the competitive team.
“I think we kind of write off play as something that high school kids don’t do anymore, but I think we’ve seen over the past two years that learning and growing through play is really the best way to teach, at least in my opinion,” Whitt said.
9 photos from trick-or-treating at Downtown Racine businesses in 2020
Captain America, Batgirl and a pumpkin
Little lion
The Candy Crawl, a trick or treating route through more than 25 Racine businesses on and around Main Street, is coordinated by Downtown Racine Corp. It is hosted from 11 a.m.-4 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays, starting Oct. 17 through Halloween, which lands on a Saturday this year. Many of the businesses handed out candy at their doorways or inside their shops, with families (many of them wearing masks) moving from storefront to storefront to get the goodies. For more information, go to racinedowntown.com/event/candy-crawl-2.
A SUPER Elsa costume!
Two kids, one dressed as Elsa from the film "Frozen" and another as Superman, carry bags of candy down Main Street on Saturday as they participate in Candy Crawl, a trick-or-treating route through more than 25 Racine businesses coordinated by Downtown Racine Corp. Although one more Candy Crawl is scheduled, for 11 a.m.-4 p.m. on Saturday (Halloween), 10 local pediatricians from Advocate Aurora Health have advised against trick or treating this year, due to the danger of spreading COVID-19 as Wisconsin remains a nationwide hotspot.
Who you gonna call? GHOSTBUSTERS!
A child dressed as one of the Ghostbusters carries a bag of candy down Main Street on Saturday during the Candy Crawl.
A family of masks at Abrazo Coffee
Marshmello makes an appearance in Downtown Racine
Mickey Mouse goes trick or treating for the first time
Little lion and family
The Candy Crawl, a trick or treating route through more than 25 Racine businesses on and around Main Street, is coordinated by Downtown Racine Corp. It is hosted from 11 a.m.-4 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays through Halloween, which lands on a Saturday this year. Many of the businesses handed out candy at their doorways or inside their shops, with families (many of them wearing masks) moving from storefront to storefront to get the goodies. For more information, go to racinedowntown.com/event/candy-crawl-2.
Stay safe while crossing, tricking and treating
