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Playing computer games for babies: the new parent-child tradition?

Imagine snuggling up with your toddler to look at a picture book together that is interactive, musical, responsive, and speaks to you?

This is the experience for people who engage in that relatively new hobby: playing computer games with babies.

JumpStart’s Knowledge Adventure calls it “lapware,” Kiddies Games’ logo is “Hop on the lap and tap,” and Sesame Street’s “Baby and Me” opens with an animation of a baby monster hopping onto a monster’s lap. dad to play the computer. Playing computer games with your baby is touted as a fun activity that a child and her caregiver can share together. And rightly so, because whatever the activity, physical and loving closeness is an important ingredient babies need for healthy intellectual, emotional, and physical development.

Reading a bedtime story to an anxious toddler is a tradition in many homes. As children get older, this can be replaced by watching TV together. Our parents’ families listened to the radio together. Playing on the computer with a young child can become a new kind of family tradition. Personal computers and the Internet are making their way into more and more homes. Some parents use the computer at work and are happy to share the computer for a fun activity with their children. Other parents want to make sure their kids are computer-savvy. Well-designed, interactive, educational computer games engage young children as much as television and are more educational than television because they encourage the child to interact and think, rather than passively watch and listen. These are the reasons for the growing popularity of computer programs for young children. Although it is a relatively small industry, it has been said that baby software is a very fast growing industry.

What kind of computer software is available for babies, toddlers, and preschoolers? There are free games on websites and there are downloadable software and CDROMs that you can buy. Most software for this age group is games, but there are also computer storybooks. Wonderful websites that offer free games, many of which are suitable for preschoolers (preschoolers can click with the mouse) are:

[http://www.sesamestreet.org/sesamestreet]

http://www.noggin.com

http://www.cbc.ca/kidscbc

http://www.abc.net.au/children/games

http://www.meddybemps.com

Great free sites for babies (whose skills tend to be more limited to pounding on the keyboard) are:

http://www.kiddiesgames.com

http://www.toddletoons.com

The CDROM or download software you buy is often better than free games on the Internet. The games tend to be superior (more graphics, more music, more complicated games for older kids) and the software takes up the entire screen, which is more appropriate for very young children who click anywhere on the screen. Some of the known producers are:

Reader Rabbit software from http://www.learningcompany.com

JumpStart software from http://www.knowledgeadventure.com

Fisher-Price software from http://www.knowledgeadventure.com

Sesame Street Software from http://www.encoresoftware.com or http://www.amazon.com

[http://www.babywow.com]

Computer game software for this age group conscientiously strives to be adequately educational. To judge their effectiveness for your child, try them on your child. If your child finds it fun, then it’s probably educational. For a baby, fun usually means that the game responds in some way to random keystrokes and mouse clicks, and that the game continues in a positive way even when the baby isn’t getting any input. A preschooler will need more challenges or more educational content, but the game should be designed to always be fun, positively reactive, and self-solving when the child doesn’t get the right answer. At this age, it is more important that computer games contribute positively to self-esteem than painstakingly correct incorrect answers about educational concepts that the child will master anyway when he grows up. The KiddiesGames.com software is meticulous in its adherence to these rules.

What types of skills are learned by playing computer games for young children? Obviously, computer programs are not suitable for practicing gross motor skills or even fine motor skills. However, there are many types of educational concepts that computer games can help a child master, including shapes, sounds, cause and effect, identifying and naming things (such as objects and colors), increasing vocabulary, language concepts , letter and number shapes, counting, pattern recognition, looking for details, and building words. At KiddiesGames, we strive to offer toddler games that are out of the ordinary, such as foreign language exposure and practicing phone positions for dialing emergencies. The reactivity and interactivity of computer programs is, of course, superior to that of books, and can be superior to that of toys, especially in the area of ​​language. Computer games for babies are also cited as excellent resources for children with special educational needs, because these games are simple, joyful, brightly colored, patient, controlled by the child, and allow the child to make things happen.

An official recommendation from the American Academy of Pediatrics at http://aappolicy.aappublications.org/cgi/content/full/pediatrics%3B107/2/423 is to “Dissuade children younger than 2 years of age from watching television and encourage them to be more interactive. activities that promote proper brain development, such as talking, playing, singing, and reading together.” This has been taken as a tip to avoid exposing those young children to the computer. However, well-designed children’s software actually encourages those great “talking, playing, singing, and reading together” activities. By carrying out the play activities proposed by the computer game, the caregiver is provided with a framework or script to carry out these “talk, play, sing and read” activities with the child. Experts now say that while baby computer games shouldn’t replace toys, blocks and books and shouldn’t be used as an electronic babysitter, they are another valid toy resource. For example, a summer 2004 newsletter from the Hawaii State Department of Health at [http://www.hawaii.gov/health/family-child-health/eis/summer2004] encourage playing with lapware. The emphasis is not on acquiring measurable skills or getting answers correct, but rather on open-ended exploration by the child, which is another way of saying “having fun.” Children are programmed to learn and practice what they have learned by playing and having fun.

Playing computer games with your young child is not yet a family tradition. However, it is an enjoyable sharing activity that is becoming increasingly popular.

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