Will they ever get off the gamebox?

The most common fear in parents when dealing with autonomy of the video gaming.

We've all heard about de-schooling, whereby parents are encouraged to allow the child re-discover themselves. No schedule, no lessons, no expectations. Just pure freedom to let themselves go and re-discover thier own intrinsic motivation, without us diverting them off thier natural course.

Well, my story today is about me and my kid's journey of video gaming, so far.

Today, I had the opportunity to say, Yes, they do get off thier butt and ask to do something new. They can and is capable of wanting new things(and not necessary just new video games) and new experiences. They are capable of getting fed-up playing infront of the tv and yearn for a change of scenery.

Gecko Jnr shown me this. On and off in the past 2 years, he will have a glut of video gaming which will last anything between 3 weeks to 3, 4 months or even more.

But then, there will come a day that he's satiated and decided the video games is boring (HORROR!!! I never thought I will ever hear that word- video games, boring!!?? LOL!). This is the time, he'll ask for new experiences.

Last year, he asked for sailing classes and an electric drum. Unfortunately, he is under age, no sailing school will take him in, and as for the drum, we just didn't have the budget.

This year, he asked for fencing classes, which he will be starting this week, and an electric keyboard, which we can afford.

Yesterday, we spent hours infront of his pc, playing his old Tanko construction game, demolishing, building and moving all those diggers, cement tanks and platform trucks around his little Tanko city.

Now, if you make an effort to disregard everything, and just focus on your child even for just 1/2 an hour, you'll realised lessons can be derived from such simple, unscheduled and un-coordinated situation.

Yesterday, Jnr not only paid alot of careful attention planning his city (could be age-related), but he was also very interested in naming all his buildings, in very creative ways. He was doing what is known as "divergent spellings", as described here in Wikipedia.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spelling#Divergent_spelling

There was Cipperz Fish Monger. I said to him "Chip-pers?" He said, "No mum, it's not spelt CH, it's spelt "Ci", so it's pronounced "Kippers". Good point LOL!

Then there was Padd Lokk, well, I'll let you figure it out what do this shop sells.

We also had the opportunity to discuss and understand the concept of singular and plural as in where the apostrohe stands, before or after the "s", means different quantity.

Then we went out for the afternoon, catching up with friends. We had a great time.

Came home after dinner, Jnr went straight back onto his pc. He started another game called Star Wars Pit Droid Puzzles. It is a game of planning and sorting, ensuring all the tiny multicoloured pit droids (they looked like colourful worker ants)
ends up in the right spot. Kinda like The Lemmings.

Jnr was soon busy clicking away, placing directional signs, syphoning the Pit droids to thier individual colour post, adding in self-spraying paint stations to change the colours of the Pit droids to match the station they are heading to. And so much more.

It was really interesting to observe how his brain works, planning, assessing and implementing his solutions, as his little fingers were tapping away on the keyboard and clicking away at the mouse.

His divergent spelling continues on thru this game. As he progress thru the night, he was saving and labelling his many creations with very creative names, and spellingz.

So, will they ever unstuck themselves from the gamebox?

My answer is, yes they will. If you just be patient, and still continue to offer an array of choices, like foods, drinks, parks, window shopping at the local toy shop or go check out some new games? For you'll never know when will be that day when your offer will seem much more enticing than that boring old game that they have been sitting in front of, for weeks.

A trip to the local pizza place to pick up a pizza for lunch (i know there is such thing as delivery service, but the objective here is to entice them to go stretch thier legs abit and take a break.) A short trip to the local shops to buy a loaf of bread, with a reward of a lolly or ice cream, for everyone needs little incentives to entice them to do something, sometimes.

I am convinced Jnr's interest in fencing classes is from him playing Pirates of the Carribean for weeks. Therefore I can't complain about video gaming for it has helped spawned many new interests, discussions and not forgetting the numerous opportunity and platforms to explain "lessons" to my kid.