Educational Games Vs. Video Games

Educational games Vs. Video games

Violent games a disaster or just a regular kind of games? No doubt those children are interested and attracted to video games especially violent ones. But as they are children and are young to know the right and the wrong, they do not know that such games are dangerous as well. So this is the role of parents, that many of them are not aware that violent games may harm their children. Parents do not take care of what their children are playing, although there are negative consequences that result from it. On the other hand, educational games have positive consequences that benefit children. Although video games impact the child's character, so there is no doubt that educational games will gain children much benefits and advantages. Video games became very popular to people in different ages especially kids and teenagers and due its harmful effect, children have to be adapted to educational games because of physiological and psychological reasons.

Children addicted to video games especially violent ones without taking care of its disadvantages. Video games affect children personality and the psychological part in his life. As violent games carry many kind of aggression as wrestling, killing and destructing, the child begin to take this attitude and learn aggression moves from these games. The situation becomes worse when the child begin to apply these aggressive acts to his siblings and friends at school. That will lead to an injury to himself or to his friends. In addition to that, the child will take nervous acts at any situations that have pressure. For example when his parents make him a punishment, he may get angry and aggressive to them. Another impact on the child's personality is the addiction to video games. Children that spend a plenty of time in front of video games become addicted to it. They will be addicted to an extent that they will have to play games every day and sometimes only a few while after they finish playing. That will lead to a complete isolation of their home atmosphere; they may even not hear their mother or father calling them or the phone and door ringing. Other negative effects related to the physiological part to the child are; addiction to video games may lead to a headache that resulted from the radiations coming outside the monitor of the computer. In addition to that violent games affect the children's brain and nervous system in long or short term period of time. For instance, the article ''Violent Video Games and Brain Functioning'' has discussed the effects caused by video games on the brain. The author stated 'a study recently conducted by researchers at Michigan State University has proven what we have long suspected: Violent video games cause aggression. Using MRI brain scans of players who played at least five hours of a popular violent video game each week, the scientists definitively showed that the game caused unmistakably aggressive brain activity while the players were playing. In other words, the players' brains were acting as if they were really engaged in the actions of their onscreen counterparts. That means that there is a part in the brain that controls the way of dealing with others, and as the researchers proved that this part is affected and harmed, that lead to the aggression of the child. Another article concerning the physical effect of video games on children is ''The Violent Side of Video Games'' written by Sohn, Emily, she was speaking that when she used to play video games there was strange reaction added to him, there was physical effects as well such as anxiety resulting stomach pains and his heart beats faster. After that the article had a discussion about what happens to the brain under title "brain clues" the article stated that there is an organ called Amygdala in the brain Is activated because of video games and when this organ is activated that means that the person have orders from the brain to his body that there is danger coming or to run away, so breathe slows down and blood rushes to your brain core which is not good. Then the author began discussing that these children have to play less violent games and to play other games that depend on mentality. As for parents they need to know lot things concerning video games so as to keep their children safe. That what Gentile, Douglas wanted to deliver in his article '' The effects of video games on children: what parents need to know''. In this article he said that The video games industry is now over 30 years old. In these years researchers found that the educational software and games can are very effective to the children's academic skill. Within the same years also video games are spread through children. The author wanted the parents to know and consider both positive and negative sides of video games. For the positive sides those video games teaches children healthy skills and the author gave an example golf video games that it made children have more control of force. For the negative sides video games affect the children's physical health including muscular, postural and skeletal disorders. Then he said that the researches ended with two things to be considered by parents which are the amount of playing video games and the type of games they are playing. The author also stated "Video games are natural teachers". He meant by that those children learn a lot from video games, they are highly engaged by it.

Although the video games have many negative sides to those who play it a lot of time, it carries some positive outcomes to those children who play it in a reasonable amount of time. As video games require a high response in some games such as adventure games as Mario, it will increase the child's response at any situation. Also video games will increase the concentration and thinking of children as there are many games that make the child think of how they may clear a level and concentrate on that. Other games aid the child in increasing their creativity and imagination such as puzzle, building and strategy games. In article ''Video Games: Cons and Pros'' at education.com site the author proved the pros and cons by answering questions. One of these questions is "Do you see any other advantages to playing video games?" this question is related by the positive part of video games. He answered the question that games may release stress of children and academics. On the other hand he illustrated the effects on academics caused by video games. He said that video games affect the reaction of the child after playing video games, he become more aggressive and unsociable.

Educational games are useful for children and have many positive academic consequences.