Hello there, my name is Panos, I am from Greece and this is my first post. It's a paper i wrote myself when I studied Computer Science in the UK. It wasn't possible to upload the whole paper but here is a part of it.
Enjoy.
Social skills:
In many situations, video games have made kids who are not so popular among their classmates, finding common interests with kids that also play video games, while the communication between them appears to be easier and much more interesting. In addition, playing a video game with your friend is a chance to get to knoweach other better. Moreover, nowadays, most of the games offer either co-op or online features, where you can play against other players by using the internet. Going against the belief that gamers are unsociable nerds, it is a fact that gamers who use these modes, have showed advanced social skills and prosocial behavior that had an effect on their life outside the games. Also, players of communal games, are more likely to gather people with whom they share same thoughts and beliefs, for a common cause, like raising money for a charity or any other good cause.
History learning:
A lot of strategy games are based in real historical events. In this games the players must learn what really happened so they can understand they gameplay and continue playing, as video games keep them focused and concentrated. According to , many experiments have been done in students. For example, in an urban lower school, students were divided into two groups. The first group was playing a video game about Ancient Egypt while the other group made a completed a research with the same subject. In a test given after this the first group did much better than the second one.
Games designed for diseases:
It may sound odd, but games improve, indeed, your children’s mental health. There are many instances of that. One of them is the Re-mission game which was distributed among young cancer patients. This game teaches them how to adhere their cancer treatments. The game is still considered a successful treatment approach. There are many similar software, helping not just children to overcome their diseases. “Packy and Marlon” (diabetes), “‘Bronkie the Bronchiasaurus” (asthma self-management) and “Rex Ronan” (smoking prevention) are some of them that are available through ‘Click Health. (www.clickhealth.com)
Games and Dyslexia:
According to kidshealth.org, dyslexia is a learning problem that kids face. Dyslexia makes it difficult for them to read and spell. It is a problem located inside the brain. Nevertheless, scientists teamed up to develop a game that “rewires the children with dyslexia and activates those areas of the brain critical to reading skills. With intensive remedial training, their brains begin to function more like those of normal readers.” The game is called Fast ForWord and provides the dyslexic kid with tasks, which, when completed, the kid moves forward to more complex ones, while being monitored by professionals who check their progress. The results are impressive: years of treatments reduced to a few weeks.