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Let Children Get Bored Again

nytimes.com

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Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#111

Post by hopler »

leetcrew wrote: post #78
watwut wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is much less of a problem on yard. There is less lashing out toward unplaying family members and they are more likely to abandon or solve frustrating situation. See, and when they are not playing video game they are responding questions without trouble and I don't have to tiptoe around then. They are more willing to breat the game for answer or help. I don't have to treat them as someone special who can be approac…

if the kids in your life are verbally attacking other family members when they lose and screaming at you when you try to ask them a question, I agree, that is unacceptable behavior. I still take issue with the responding to questions thing though. I think your perspective shows that you don't think games are a legitimate activity, so you don't have to care about interrupting them. think about it more like football pr…

I have never seen 10 year olds "teabagging faggots" at Little League soccer.

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#112

Post by hopler »

birksherty wrote: post #64
tarr11 wrote: post #4

The parade of concerned parents writing these kinds of articles have conveniently forgotten how much TV and video games many of us consumed in 1980s and 1990s. This stuff reads like satire: “Rather than teach them to absorb material that is slower, duller and decidedly two-dimensional, like a lot of worthwhile information is, schools cave in to what they say children expect: fun. ” The kids are going to be alright.

I am a millennial myself. We watched tv, had video games. But also we played lot more in playgrounds for fun, talk, meet up, discuss in real space and had real laughs. Now I have seen kids in my neighborhood who don't know each other. In the free time they watch tv alone and uses social media most of the time. Only time they go out is for school, occasional shopping and other chores. I have not seen them with friends…

When I was a kid (in the Jurassic era) kids did stupid stunts to be popular and overreacted to everything too.

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#113

Post by hopler »

floatingatoll wrote: post #14
tarr11 wrote: post #4

The parade of concerned parents writing these kinds of articles have conveniently forgotten how much TV and video games many of us consumed in 1980s and 1990s. This stuff reads like satire: “Rather than teach them to absorb material that is slower, duller and decidedly two-dimensional, like a lot of worthwhile information is, schools cave in to what they say children expect: fun. ” The kids are going to be alright.

As a kid from the 80s, my parents prohibited video game consoles except for a GameBoy during Thanksgiving trips. It took me years of work as a child to successfully overcome their restrictions and get games onto the family computer. At one point I synthesized a hybrid of every Jazz Jackrabbit level and bonus level into a single launcher sceeen, something the publisher hadn’t because DLC and GOTY weren’t things yet. I…

I don't thing Super Mario Brothers makes one a math professor

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#114

Post by sarcasmOrTears »

csmeder wrote: post #41

There are two separate issues: A. 1,000 ft view: drugs are bad. Both chemical drugs and electronic entertainment that is engineered to be addictive. Light weight drugs in small doses are less bad: 90s vs now. B. 50,000 ft view: the real problem. When rats are put in normal laboratory settings they choose drugs over food and water if given the choice. Most of our research on addiction is based on this. In a study wher…

That forest kindergarden looks awesome. Too bad it's a liability hell in basically all western countries. Freedom-oriented laws would solve a lot of problems.

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#115

Post by ThomPete »

sarcasmOrTears wrote: post #114
csmeder wrote: post #41

There are two separate issues: A. 1,000 ft view: drugs are bad. Both chemical drugs and electronic entertainment that is engineered to be addictive. Light weight drugs in small doses are less bad: 90s vs now. B. 50,000 ft view: the real problem. When rats are put in normal laboratory settings they choose drugs over food and water if given the choice. Most of our research on addiction is based on this. In a study wher…

That forest kindergarden looks awesome. Too bad it's a liability hell in basically all western countries. Freedom-oriented laws would solve a lot of problems.

Its actually not. Only in the US.

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#116

Post by prawn »

sarcasmOrTears wrote: post #114
csmeder wrote: post #41

There are two separate issues: A. 1,000 ft view: drugs are bad. Both chemical drugs and electronic entertainment that is engineered to be addictive. Light weight drugs in small doses are less bad: 90s vs now. B. 50,000 ft view: the real problem. When rats are put in normal laboratory settings they choose drugs over food and water if given the choice. Most of our research on addiction is based on this. In a study wher…

That forest kindergarden looks awesome. Too bad it's a liability hell in basically all western countries. Freedom-oriented laws would solve a lot of problems.

I'm in Australia. My 6yo son attends the same primary school I did 30+ years ago. They now have a "nature play" area with softball-sized rocks and 6' long baseball-diameter logs that the kids use in breaks to build forts, help climb things, etc. They use the rocks to crush things up or build structures in a dry creek. The hover-parent in me can see a million ways it will end in disaster, but aside from a bloodied fingernail and some scrapes, I haven't heard of anything too bad in the 12ish months he's been there. It's a definite trend here in designing play spaces for children.

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#117

Post by marktangotango »

theshrike79 wrote: post #39

The most important mission in a dad's life is make sure his kids are bored out of their minds often enough and need to come up with something to do on their own.

Our kids get limited screen time, like an hour a day on weekends and 20 min during weekdays. A lot of the rest of the time it’s “play with your sibling” although we do board games sometimes. I’ve really been impressed how my kids use their screen time. My son builds projects inspired by what he sees and our daughter sings and pretend plays. They come up with games on their own. It’s really been awesome to see how they’ve integrated it.

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#118

Post by kurtisc »

solipsism wrote: post #59
hombre_fatal wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there's some truth to that, though. As a former video game addict, I look back on my time spent gaming as largely a waste. Most of it was a compulsion, like staying up until 4am re-queuing in Dota. Or grinding some armor piece. But I don't look back with regret on any of my time spent reading. I think most people here know what I'm talking about. Why is that? I can think of a few guesses. Books aren't in the…

I don't look back with regret on any of my time spent reading. I think most people here know what I'm talking about. Why is that? Easy one. It's because this is how society teaches you to feel. You grew up in a world where schools tell you read anything you can get your hands on. They have book fairs, summer reading contests, entire libraries full of both nonfiction and fiction. It's drilled into your from an early a…

Haven't books dripping with philosophy also always been considered appropriate?

But I agree. Just look at an airport book shop's best sellers: is anyone really getting anything enlightening out of a trite mystery book that they don't get from TV? We (or at least I) feel some guilt for not having read classics and then attribute the same feeling to any sort of reading. Provided it's on a dead tree.

I've spent ages reading A Song of Ice and Fire, ultimately that is just the same as time wasted on the internet or TV if what I'm valuing is time spent on self improvement. Even reading a manpage is more valuable.

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#119

Post by kurtisc »

ThalesX wrote: post #98
solipsism wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because a video game move forward at it's speed, setting, since it keeps things going regardless, it's own agenda. I feel like maybe you've not done much gaming? This sounds like Tipper Gore telling us about how heavy metal music inspires devil worship.

I took a college course in game design, one of the key components of said topic is ‘flow’. You want to keep the player in a state where it’s neither too hard nor too easy for them to continue playing. Make it too hard and the player loses interest. Make it too easy, the same behavior can be observed. If you want a game, you want to keep the player in a state of flow, if you can’t do that, the game would presumably no…

Like a book that you don't want to put down?

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#120

Post by taborj »

bitexploder wrote: post #83
dkersten wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And how we used to think whatever the latest in graphics was, was oh so realistic and amazing! I played MUD’s for a few years when I was younger and in hindsight it was amazing: while the writing wasn’t typically as good as a book, you still filled in the world and characters with your imagination and it was both interactive and social. I still have some vivid memories of it that are as clear as if it had been a mode…

Some MUDs back in the day had combat and skill systems as complex as any modern MMOs. They were the precursor to MMORPG.

We're off topic here, but there are still plenty of MUDs around, and they're still as good or better.

Check out https://www.mudconnect.com/index.html

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