Parenting and Video Games

I've been contributing a bit to a new blog started by a friend who is about to become a father for the first time, at least as far as he knows. It's kind of a place where dads or dads-to-be can hang, plead for help, or help those doing the pleading.

Given that I recently obtained the privelege of giving Bill Gates several hundred of my hard-earning dollars for an Xbox 360 and various accessories, I pose the question of how much parents should let their kids play video games. Here are some excerpts:

The conventional wisdom is that games are bad for you. They encourage lethargy and lead to entire generations of kids being converted into glazed-eyed, slack-jawed zombies ever eager for their next fix of pixelated crack.

New research is showing, however, that games have definite benefits. Steven Johnson's book Everything Bad is Good for You purports to show how popular culture, and video games in particular, hone cognitive skills. After all, hunting down and capping rival crack dealers in a limited time while evading police is really an exercise in thinking out the box, albeit one wrapped in a package that is unsavory to many.

And:

One other reason I let him play is that it's yet another activity we can do together. And unlike watching a movie or cartoon, it's something that has a high-degree of interaction and a sense of accomplishment for "winning". Should it preclude other forms of parental bonding? No, of course not. And we play board games, and do puzzles, and read books, and draw pictures together, too. Video games is just another thing we can do together.

So, head on over and check out the full post, poke around the site, and drop some pearls of fatherly or motherly wisdom.