Benefits of physical play v/s gaming

Vacation times are difficult for moms. Especially for the primary and middle schooler kids, there has to be activities that engage them for a long time. With engagement they need to provide the kids with fun, creativity and should be challenging enough to engage them and not bore them. I have never been a fan of online gaming for kids. I would like my kid to indulge in a more physical play than something that is on screen. On screen games would make the child dull adversely affecting the social and creative skills. I also prefer inviting my son’s friends home to play with him, this way I can monitor what’s happening and supervise the games they play.

Cars have always been a point of fascination for my kid since he was very tiny and he has a massive Hot Wheels collection to support that. While browsing through gifts for my kids 6^th birthday which is next week I came across this amazing track system from Hot Wheels that has endless possibilities of play and engagement. It also allows the kid to get introduced to physics, engineering and has a purposeful play. Educational toys are always better for children than non-educational ones as these toys improve the child’s creativity, focus, attention to detail and concentration span.

As I am an artist and would like my child to explore that side of his personality this toy gives me access to unleash his creativity while preparing the track that he desires. Since one can arrange the track differently and it gets challenging with each different play, this would help enhance the kid’s problem solving skills and encourage experimentation. I had to share this amazing video done by Artist Rob here:

http://bit.ly/HotWheels-DesertStorm

The game not only would enable moms to engage their kids for long periods of time but also has possibilities evoking the child’s problem solving:

• Experimenting with different angles every time to change the speed of the cars
• Creating diversions utilizing the boosters and connectors
• Challenge themselves and their friends with head-to-head races and stunts
• Endless possibilities of creating different tracks technically and creatively
• Challenging friends to up the ante every-time they play with the kit

I can’t wait to get my hands on a box of this awesome stuff. More than my kid it looks like the dad is looking forward to getting this box home! Share with us how excited this gets you mommies and daddies.