Are There Benefits of Video Games?

This week I have been spending a lot of time playing video games in the evening. I got to a point Monday night and had to ask myself if I was having fun or just killing time. To be honest, I really felt like I was just killing time and felt like I could be doing something more productive. It turns out I wasn't making any progress in my game and when I figured out what I was doing wrong, it became much more entertaining. However it got me thinking about if there are any benefits of video games.

Video games have been a part of my family since I was very young. My Dad had a DEC PDP-11 computer installed in our house and I used it to play a Star Trek game when I was about 10 years old. There were a few other games but Star Trek is the one I remember the most. Later we had an Atari 400 computer and it had the arcade version of Pac-Man. My dad wanted to know if there were any benefits of video games and had a hypothesis that they could help you read faster. He used Pac-Man to test it. Every so often an item appears in the Pac-Man maze and if you eat the item, you score points. The first item is a cherry and it is worth something like 100 points. The more points an item is worth, the faster everything goes. The nice thing about the Atari 400 version of Pac-Man is that you can choose which item you want to appear in the maze without having to start with the cherry. That means you could set the game to the "key" or highest level and everything moved amazingly fast.

My dad would bring in a bunch of kids from the neighborhood and time them reading several pages out of a book. Then he would have them play Pac-Man at key level for 30 minutes followed by having them read different pages out of the same book. I forget the exact numbers but there was a significant increase in reading speed for everyone my dad tested. My siblings and I used that as justification for playing more video games.

Now I find myself wondering if there are more benefits to playing video games. We all have only 24 hours in a day and I would not recommend spending all of that time doing one single thing. I know that after a busy day at the office I just want to relax. In the past I have watched television or read a book. I still enjoy reading and have been keeping that up. I have completely given up on TV though. I figure that replacing television with playing video games is a fair trade. Am I wrong? Comments welcome.

Time for Glasses

I just had my birthday and have to say that getting old really sucks. While I tell everyone that I am still 17, my true age is slightly north of that. Ok, maybe a lot north of that. This year for my birthday I got a string of doctor's appointments and news that I had better start taking better care of myself. One of those doctor's appointments was with an eye doctor.

My vision has always been pretty good and so I have never felt it necessary to visit an eye doctor. This year I couldn't opt out of it as my regular care physician made me go. My wife celebrated that I was finally visiting the optometrist as she has been wearing glasses for most of our married life. She was in the room when I sat down for the eye exam. The eye chart went up on the wall and I got to read off a bunch of letters. Then I read the smaller ones and had it confirmed that I still have 20/20 vision. That was the good news and I had a smug look on my face as my wife accepted the news that I don't need glasses for distance.

Then it came time to test my reading vision. My wife knew the outcome as she has slowly watched my arms become too short to read the time on my watch. I wish I could say that I came away from the appointment without needing any glasses. Fortunately I only need them to read and I don't think they are that strong of a value. Furthermore I can get them at any drugstore without a prescription. So Friday evening I picked up a 3-pak of glasses: one for the house, one for the boat, and one for the office.

I have been wearing my glasses in the evenings and have felt a much stronger urge to read. I didn't think my desire to read had diminished that much in the past few years. However now I find it much more enjoyable and realize that my diminishing eyesight has had a negative effect on my reading habits. So if you find yourself not wanting to read as much as you used to, you might want to get your eyes checked. Of course you also have the option to get an electronic reading device like a Kindle and just use a bigger font.

Technology Can't Replace Mom and Dad

I have an international flight today as I head from Salt Lake to Tokyo, Japan. That means I had to be at the airport 2 hours early. I showed up and expected to spent time in lines. Just 15 minutes after I arrived, I am checked in, have gone through security, and have an hour and 45 minutes to kill before I leave. I figured I would add something to my blog today in the hopes of killing a little bit of time.

I was leaving the office on Thursday and was having a conversation with one of the department admins. She has two young kids and a mother that loves to play Grandma. The admin's mom wants to buy a Kindle Fire for each of the grandkids. The oldest is only 4 and the youngest isn't quite a year old. I am someone that embraces technology but can't see the logic in that purchase. The admin explained that her mom thinks the young kids can use it to watch videos or be read to. We both agreed that it is a bad idea though.

One of the joys of being a parent is reading to your kids. I used to read to my own kids every night. We read the complete Harry Potter series as well as a good chunk of the Hardy Boys mysteries. One of my kids favorite series was Swallows and Amazons. Research shows that while it is important for a mother to read to her children, it is also important for Dad to do so as well. So while we have technology that allows machines to read to our children, that doesn't mean it is a good idea. Trust me on this one.