I was talking to a friend of my mother's recently. She directed some questions to my 5 year old son, and he started chattering on about Minecraft, his latest obsession. I had to explain all that is Minecraft to luddite. The second she heard the words "video game" an audible tsk tsk escaped her lips. I don't think she understands the world of video games today. However, she is not alone as quite a few of my mommy friends don't let their kids have video games of any kind (which is a shame because I could hook them up with my connections). I respect their choices, but I hope that they don't judge me for my choices.
As a disclaimer, my husband makes video games for a living. I personally would consider myself a hardcore-casual gamer, as in when I get into a game that I like, I will generally play to completion. My kids were exposed to video games from a very young age.
When my eldest was 18 months old, she discovered the wonder of the GameBoy, as did we on a 6 hour cross country flight. Shortly thereafter, the iPhone debuted, in all of it's toddler amusing glory. My friends watched with awe as she flipped between aps, showing her favorites, and then showing off pictures, and even took pictures of them.
Now, a half dozen years later, my kids are big into video games. They do spend a lot of time playing games, but much less time watching television. I actually prefer they play games, where they are an active participant, rather than sit passively and watch TV or a movie. I think most parents and educators would be pretty amazed at some of the learning that takes place during game play.
Minecraft is the game of the moment at our house. It is like Legos in the virtual world (and you don't ever step on them!). You can build things, dig in the dirt, raise animals, plant trees, all in a virtual world. There are a couple of different modes in this game. In Survival mode, you start with nothing, and have to craft pick axes and armour and build houses. Then somewhere along the way, they discovered Creative mode, where all possible objects are at your disposal from the get go (no more mining for hours looking for one lousy diamond). My kids had played for several months in Survival mode before they discovered Creative mode. They were all like, how did we not know about this sooner?! Now they build all kinds of crazy huge structures, stores that sell vegetables and lumber, waterfalls from the clouds, lava filled tubs, and huge roller coasters. The level of imagination they display is incredible. There is a magenta carpet path that connects their houses. This game allows for 2 players. When they stray away from each other, they use their maps to find one another. They make up little stories about their villagers. All in all, I feel it is time well spent.
Skylanders will forever be an all time favorite in our house. One of my favorite parts of this game, as a mother and an educator is how they speak the text, and highlight the words as they are spoken. For emerging and struggling readers, this is a fabulous way to support their reading skills. In the most recent iteration with the addition of the Swap Force characters, my kids are learning about combinations and permutations. There are 16 guys, each with 2 pieces, and a total possible 256 combinations. There is a chart in the menu that shows what combinations you have used. My kids have made it their mission to try to get all 256 combinations.
Scribblenauts is yet another great game that game that allows for spontaneous learning. In this game you let your imagination run wild, and insert whatever random object pops into your head into the scene. The trick is, you have to know how to spell the word. After a dozen "Mom how do you spell. . ." I got wise. Sound it out. If they get close, autocorrect with in the game will do the rest and make suggestions. They are all gaining confidence as spellers and as readers by playing this game.
Those are just our 3 favorite games of the moment. Otherwise there are so many skills that are implicitly taught in the video games that they play. For example, you need 50 whatevers to open said area. My son learned to subtract at the ripe old age of 4 because he knew he had 39 whatevers, and needed 11 more to get to 50. Physics is another biggy. Your roller coaster can't make it up the second hill, try making the first hill taller. Can the motorcycle make it through the loop? No? Try going faster. They may not know the terms momentum centripetal force yet, but they get concepts.
In this era, there is so much great stuff out there. It's not all like Grand Theft Auto (but don't get me wrong, I have played GTA and loved it, though my kids have not yet experienced it). Learning and playing are not mutually exclusive as any Kindergarten teacher will tell you.
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