Grand Theft Auto, would not be a game or games like it, that I would purchased for my child, to improve cognitive abilities. I purchased thinking games such as mysteries, eye/hand coordination with an element of logic, chess, checkers and other games that would improve the upper level thinking skills as well as automatic recall in basic math facts.

It did not make my child any smarter than she was, but it certainly improved her cognitive weaknesses, and enhance performance in school work. Bonus part, video games boosted her self-confidence that created internal motivation to work hard on her school work. If she could go through all the levels of a new game in one week, when others took months to do the same thing, she had that image inside her head, it could be applied to her school work. The video games help to eliminate the negative track in her head, that kept on saying she was too dumb for school.

She has never been a great fan of action games, where thinking skills are not required. She finds them really boring, and prefers something where she uses her brain to pass the time.

Actually, for me, the original studies fall under the category, “My-gosh-I-I-hope-that-this-isn’t-true”. The idea of associating games like “Grand Theft Auto” with improved cognitive functioning never did sit well with me.

That said, I think that it’s important to note that the article cited here doesn’t say that the studies findings are wrong, only that the scientific methodology is flawed. It will be interested to see how future studies will handle the opportunities to study the effects of video games on development, thinking and cognitive development in the future.

Stay tuned!

Earlier studies ‘showing’ that the video/electronic age is ‘melting’ our children’s brains are very similar.  In those studies, they did PET scans and showed that at the beginning of the study, many areas of the brain were active and lit up the scan.  As the study went on, and the children did the task many times, the brain seemed to ‘die out’ and the scans were mainly dark.

The researchers used this data to postulate that kids were turning off their brains playing these games.  However, what they actually established was the learning process.  At the beginning of any task - physical or mental - people have to think very carefully about what they are doing.  As people practice, the task becomes more and more ingrained and they don’t have to think about it - they just do it.

In other words, they proved that the mind is a muscle and can be trained.  Kill and drill?  Maybe it has some place in the learning process.

I don’t know if the brain is a muscle in the same sense as the muscles of our limbs. But I do know, what has been learned, a person must practice from time to time. At least according to the science of aging. It is also theorized that the theta waves of the brain, the more there is, the more creative the person is. The reason why I am mentioning theta waves, is often the school practices will killed off the creative processes of kids, even though it is not the intention to do so. Like other practices of the school, that will actually hinder memory processes of the students. What the progressives call drill and kill, is also a great way to improve the memory processes of children who are struggling in learning. And let us not forget, when very young, children love to hear the same story over and over. Drilling elicits new memory paths for children who have learning problems. To them it is enjoyable, because they are experiencing success right from the very beginning, if they are instructed properly. Schools might be pleasantly surprise, using Khan Academy as an example, by assigning 10 minutes daily of math drills for homework. Do the practice first, than whatever homework is assigned. The kids just might surprised the teacher by demanding harder things to do, than the usual avoidance of math.

Practice makes perfect, in my eyes is to instill automatic recall in essential facts and numbers. I had to start at the very beginning, where even forming the numbers on a flat page, (two-dimensional) was not automatic for my child.
I believe in my heart, if the public education system concentrated and studied the science in the learning and education fields, students would be much better off, than dealing with the current status-quo. Not all things that is practiced in the public schools are bad, but at the very least they should know why it is effective or not effective for the individual student or the whole class. For example, the class of 95’, never enjoy painting, and other messy art projects, until grade 7. All it was cut and paste projects, and drawing with crayons. In my eye, they hinder cognitive growth of the brain, just to spend more time in reading and math. Did it raise achievement? No. But the art lessons of water colours and oils, provided by me at home sure help my child cognitive processes improve in her handwriting, and neatness of work. By the way, I taught myself learning art from the Internet, and whatever I remembered from my school days. Her doodling is top-notched today, and actually tells a story on her frame of mind, as one teacher noted to me. If she is doodling, she is really bored in class.

The sad part is that most of the research in the various fields that have a direct relationship to education, are sitting somewhere on a dusty shelf inside the ministry of education. Rarely is the research filtered down through the levels and put in the hands of the educator to read, and have it applied it to an individual student or the whole classroom. I found this out, when I spoke to researchers who told me, and is one of the biggest reasons why they are willing to talk to parents when they make the effort to contact them. If the research is not getting to the teachers, the next best thing is to give it to the parents to passed the information to the teachers.