Turning Video Gaming in to a Creative Activity

Video games can be an amazing resource to add to your child’s learning tool belt. Not only can video games help kids learn valuable lessons, they can also be used to help your children socialize and become more creative!

Here are a few creative kids video game activities you can try to help them learn and improve.

Turning Minecraft into More Than a Kid’s Video Game

If you’ve been around MakerKids for any length of time, you’ve probably seen how highly we rate the game Minecraft. There are a few reasons for this:

• Minecraft teaches complex math and architecture skills.
• Kids can play Minecraft together and build projects together, which promotes social bonding, teamwork and communication skills.
• Minecraft can be modified through coding, so it allows us to teach our students how to program.
• By learning through an activity kids already love, exploring new or difficult ideas becomes easier and friendlier. Learning through doing has shown to be very effective.

One of our favourite parts of Minecraft is the ability to use Redstone (which is similar to modern day electrical wiring) to teach increasingly complex patterns, geography, and even some basics to electrical wiring which helps in learning STEM. In fact, we have three different kinds of programs for our students coming this fall: One for collaborative projects, one for advanced Minecraft, and one strictly for Redstone.

If you’re ready to use Minecraft as a creative activity for your kids, we have a few summer camps you can send them to which will teach them everything they need to know. In addition to the benefits outlined above, we also use group work which increases collaboration and teaches conflict resolution.

Turning Video Games into a Family/Group Activity

One of the problems with kids spending too much time playing video games is when they spend it all playing alone. There is certainly a benefit to many of the solo games, but too much time playing alone can be harmful.

One of the easiest and most beneficial ways to help your kids learn is by playing with them, and turning the game into a creative activity. Spending time gaming with your child will help you bond with them in a way that they enjoy.

More importantly, this time gaming also promotes creative thinking and many of the games improve kids’ STEM skills. Some games you can play with your kids, like the game Wipeout for the Wii, can also teach them about rhythm and timing as they need to jump over obstacles at the perfect time or else they fall in the water and lose.

Overall, there are plenty of ways to turn kids video games into fun, creative activities that also teach them valuable life skills. Allowing them to play their favourite games while in a interactive learning environment (like our Advanced Minecraft summer camps), will also help them learn faster and easier.