A question came up among my colleagues this week which I kind of ignored.
“Do you allow kids to play video games in your Library Learning Commons?”
I ignored it mostly because I was swamped with a million other things (I thought October would be a little less busy!!), but also because I was curious to see how everyone else would respond before I offered my own sentiments.
I think the responses might be typical? Many of my peers said they do not allow kids to play video games in their space. Kids can go to the cafeteria to do this. They are on screens enough, they should not be using devices to play games. My first response was, I am being too lax. That first day, I gave kids playing games a hard time. I didn’t feel really good about that.
The next day, I decided to talk to kids and listen to what they had to say. As a student voice advocate, this felt more like me.
- Why do you come to the Library to play games?
- I think your brain needs a break. When you play video games, aren’t you taxing your brain?
- Why don’t you play one of our board games? (I have a great collection of games and a giant chess board made by our students in Tech that is used every single minute of the day).
“The Library is brighter and way more comfortable”
“Playing is a way I relax…I don’t have to think about it–it’s just muscle memory.”
“I am playing chess on my phone, what’s the difference?”
And then, I started to reflect on the research. I have written about gaming before and my shift of thinking around gaming and literacy both here and in Social LEADia. But recently, I have delved back into the topic, as part of my research for my parenting book, “Raising Digital Leaders” which is scheduled to be published in the Spring by DBC. I found this article about the soft skills gaming refines, as well two TED Talks around the topic very interesting.
The first is a talk called, “Your Brain on Video Games” by Daphne Bavelier, a brain scientist and professor at the University of Geneva who talks about some of the myths and truths of video game use.
The other is by a computer scientist, Herman Narula, called “The Transformative Power of Video Games” which speaks to the power and potential of video games for our future.
Of course there is other research that does link violence in video games to lack of guilt, but for the most part the links are not overwhelmingly strong. Douglas Gentile, a developmental psychologist at Iowa State University says, “Media violence is one risk factor for aggression. It’s not the biggest, it’s also not the smallest, but it’s worth paying attention to. In another study, a video game created to improve empathy, actually helped middle schoolers become more empathetic. Bottom line: research does not in any way indicate that kids who play violent video games become serial killers or mass murders.
I finally did respond with this:
Hi friends,Been meaning to respond to this thread. We allow video games to be played in the Library LC as long as they aren’t the shoot & kill kind. I have had several chats with kids about it and I have been influenced by much literature about playing video games and the impact on the brain. Here is a TED Talk by brain scientist, Daphne Bavelier, that is particularly interesting.I have Jenga, Uno, Scrabble, Chess, and several other games in my Library and lots of kids play those, but many students play strategy kind of games on our computers and their phones and I don’t feel like there is a difference.This may not be your stance and that’s ok. But it works for us. If lots of kids are gathered around a video game or our jumbo chess game (both happen) and are too noisy, we address it.
Would love to hear your thoughts too!