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Blurring the lines: Education / Games
What makes Cure so effective as a teaching tool is its focus on fun. Even though it is filled to the brim with accurate and current scientific ideas, gamers (your children, grandchildren, and students of all ages) will find the game to be engaging, competitive, and fun!
Tangential learning
Tangential learning is the process by which people will self-educate if a topic is exposed to them in a context that they already enjoy. According to experts in natural learning, self-oriented learning training has proven to be an effective tool for assisting independent learners with the natural phases of learning. Our game exposes students to advanced concepts in a way that they already find fun; Which results in them WANTING to learn about microbiology and science.
You were already learning
Any time we play a video game we are learning! (it doesn't always feel that way, but it's true!) Generally we are learning the rules and the systems of the game. An example would be the different types of mushrooms in Super Mario Bros: Running into a green mushrooms will give you an extra life, a red mushrooms make you larger, and a brown one will hurt you. These lessons are necessary to learn in order to play the game, however they do not really help us in the real world. In Cure however many of the game mechanics someone will have to learn in order to play the game are based on the real world. This means as you play you are learning science, even though you feel like you are just playing a video game.
Complex yet attainable concepts
Playing CURE will expose you to many high level scientific concepts that are present in the game. These high level concepts are boiled down to their essence and they are presented to the player in a way that they can understand them. For example: we could give the player an item called "restriction enzymes" that can be used to cause their bacteria unit to have higher defenses against viruses. Such a little concept will give players a basic understanding of what restriction enzymes do in real life, without reading it from a text book or listening to hours of lectures. When questioned later about restriction enzymes, a CURE player could easily chime in that they know exactly what they do --- they help protect bacteria from viruses, and they would be right!
Connecting the dots
The concepts which can be learned in CURE are generally small and easy to understand. They are reinforced and reused to cohesively paint a large and accurate picture about biology and genetic engineering. For the above instance with "restriction enzymes" it is not enough to know that it is used by bacteria to have higher defences against viruses, it is important to know WHY it works, and also important WHY it is so important in microbiology and genetic engineering.
Video Games make you smarter
Video Games have been clinically proven to have a vast amount of benefits to ones cognitive abilities. Playing video games for even 30 minutes a day has been proven to increase Memory, Motor skills, and Strategic thinking. It is like the old adage goes: "if you don't use it, you lose it", so it makes sense that if you are always thinking about clever ways to 'win' a video game, you are always 'thinking' (which is great!). Even the US Navy agrees that "video game players perform 10-20% higher in perception and cognitive ability than non-video game players". With CURE, you can make every gaming second count, and learn about microbiology while you improve your cognitive capabilities, so you can get smarter while you are getting smarter! In video games, every second counts. Studies found that video game players have as much as 25% increased reaction times when it comes to making quick decisions... which comes in handy with video games in which the wrong choice and lead to a virtual death!
Scientist and Teacher approved
We have shown our game to a few respected educators and scientists to see if they think our game would help teach students about microbiology, they all agree that CURE is not only a fascinating game, but has great potential as a teaching tool. Our hopes are to have our game reviewed in depth by scientists and teachers alike in order to ensure only accurate and proven educational material makes it into CURE.
Privacy Policy

If you have any questions about our privacy policy, please feel free to contact us anytime.


We take your privacy really seriously, and we think more websites should too!


We will not share any of your personally-identifiable information (namely street addresses, first or last names, social security number or credit card numbers or even your pets first name) with anybody, not only because we have an aversion with such practices but also because we don't store it so there is nothing to share.


We will not sell any of your information (see cookies, IP addresses, and usage statistics below).


We do not currently advertise on this website, so no advertiser or company will have access to your usage statistics, information or personally identifying information.


When you use this website some information is logged automatically.


Webserver Logs

In order for you to connect to this website (or any website), that website needs to be running webhosting software; This software automatically logs information such as IP Address (see below), the time you accessed this website, what page you accessed and possibly other metrics. The reason for this type of logging is to both check for errors people might encounter when visiting this website and to monitor for hacker activity or potential exploits of our website. This information is used to review the health of our website and for maintenance, information stored in log files are not shared with any third party.


Usage Statistics

We reserve the right to log how a user may use our website (by making note of which things are clicked while you are on the website and when you clicked on them, what browser and operating system you used to access this website, and other non personally-identifiable information). This can be used to help us make the website better by analysing how the website is used and to see which pages on this website require maintenance. This information is not shared with any third party and is used solely my us to review how the website is most commonly used. No personally-identifiable information is collected as usage statistics.


Cookies

Cookies are bits of information that are stored on your computer, which are used when you navigate through a website. Our pledge is to only create cookies (only stored for a relatively short time) which will help your experience on this website and that your cookies are not stored, collected, or sold by this website. Most modern browsers have a way to disable cookies, and you are welcomed and encouraged to do so if you do not wish to store cookies on your computer. Some of the functionality on this website might not work without cookies enabled.


IP Address

When accessing the internet, your computer uses an IP addresses in order to view websites. IP Addresses act like a mailbox- and web pages are like letters. The IP address is a set of numbers and/or letters, and symbols and does not contain any personally-identifiable information in them (for instance, it does not show where you live, your name or other such information). We reserve the right to create logs which contain visitor IP Addresses (see the above: Webserver Logs and Usage Statistics) or use your IP Address to deliver to you custom content. IP Addresses are not shared or sold to any 3rd party and is only used for maintaining this website (see above: Webserver Logs and Usage Statistics).


Children's Information

We believe it is important to provide added protection for children online. We encourage parents and guardians to spend time online with their children to observe, participate in and/or monitor and guide their online activity. This website does not knowingly collect any personally identifiable information from children under the age of 13. If a parent or guardian believes that this website has in its database the personally-identifiable information of a child under the age of 13, please contact us immediately and we will use our best efforts to promptly remove such information from our records.


Website Privacy Policy Only

This privacy policy applies only to our online activities and is valid for visitors to our website and regarding information shared and/or collected there. This policy does not apply to any information collected offline or via channels other than this website. For the CURE game privacy policy please click here.


Consent

By using our website, you hereby consent to our privacy policy and agree to its terms. Privacy Policy Online Approved Site.


Update

This Privacy Policy was last updated on: Wednesday, October 22nd, 2014. Should we update, amend or make any changes to our privacy policy, those changes will be posted here.


Terms Of Use And Forum Rules


Whereas you are welcome to join us in the CURE community forums, the following rules are in place in order to keep the CURE website a fun place to visit.


#1: Do not post hateful (ie: abusive, obscene, vulgar, slanderous, threatening, etc. ) messages.
#2: Do not post any material that may violate the law.
#3: Do not post content which is offensive (namely pornography or gore).
#4: Do not advertise or google bomb.
#5: Do not annoy the moderators. If requested to stop doing something by a moderator, it is most likely because you are being annoying.
#6: Use common sense.
#7: Have fun! This is the internet after all!



Moderators can enforce the rules as they wish. They can give warnings at their discretion, but are not obligated to. Your ability to use the forums or access the website can be revoked, for reasons stated or unstated. We hope for the forums to be a place of free speech and fun, and these rules are in place to keep the place from burning down. Our motto is: minimum enforcement for maximum fun!


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