Video games are perhaps more prevalent right now than ever before. So this can create challenges for parents, grandparents and carers of children. What should you do about this issue? Are games safe for your children to play as much as they like or not? It’s something that a lot of people worry about, but that worry is often handled in the wrong way. So let’s break down the problem and look at what this means for children.
Games Can be Educational and Improve Coordination
There are some games out there that can actually teach your kids a lot. They can teach them about culture, about sports, about cooperation and many other things too. And I’m not just talking about the games that are specifically designed as educational games. It’s also thought that many games can improve the hand-eye coordination of many young people too, so that’s something to keep in mind.
Some Games Offer Harmless Fun
As well as being educational in various ways, the vast majority of games offer simple and harmless fun that passes the time. As long as children don’t spend all day playing games, there is nothing with them having fun in their down time. Whether it’s Super Mario Odyssey on Switch of the Final Fantasy 15 mobile app, there are many ways to have fun. It’s not something that people should overreact about.
Be Careful With In-Game Payments
One thing that has become more common in games over the last few years is in-game purchasing. This is when the game gives the user the chance to buy extra content within the game that’s already been purchased. If you have young children with access to your card details, this should be monitored carefully. Some kids have spent a lot of money this way without really knowing what they’re doing.
Control is Possible for Parents and Grandparents
Banning games never really works because kids find other ways of playing, and it simply makes gaming more attractive to them because it’s something they’re not allows to do. Instead, you should aim for control, which is now more than possible for the vast majority of parents and grandparents. There are parental control settings on all the major consoles and devices, so make use of them.
It’s All About Achieving the Right Balance
In the end, what it all comes down to is balance. If you can encourage your kids to spend some time outside doing active and social things with other people, there’s nothing wrong with them also playing some video games when they’re at home. A healthy balance like that will end up being very positive for most children.
Video games, in many ways, are a natural force. The hype and bluster on either side of the debate can usually be ignored. Video games aren’t going to save the world and they aren’t going to cause any major problems. As ever, the real issue here is parenting and how best we can all deal with that challenge.