Are your kids addicted to Minecraft? This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. We are always trying to come up with new, creative ways to get them unplugged and doing something that comes without batteries or power. However, if you take a few minutes to look at Minecraft from a different angle, you can actually see that this game is quite beneficial to children, as it teaches them some useful skills they can use in everyday life. Here are seven educational benefits that playing Minecraft will teach your children that you are sure to love.
1. Inspires Learning
Minecraft has underlying concepts in math, physics, and even science. In fact, many teachers have incorporated Minecraft into their classrooms to show children these concepts and reach them at their level of understanding. Some of these concepts are about volume and space, gravity, and even geometry. Overall, it is a fun approach to teaching children educational concepts. Who knew teachers could be passionate about a video game?
2. Teaches Problem Solving Skills
Minecraft teaches children logic and problem-solving skills. When children are in ‘Survival mode’ they can be under attack, hungry, or any other problem that the game may present. Children must now figure out how to protect their buildings and even come up with ways to create food sources or solve other problems. They begin to learn how to do these things by trial and error, such as building protective fences for their buildings to keep monsters out. This has a real impact on their critical thinking and problem solving skills. You can’t beat a game that promotes positive ways to solve problems!
3. Improves Hand/Eye Coordination
While in ‘Survival mode’ in Minecraft, players are often faced with many different obstacles and problems that need to be solved to stay in the game. Often times, this requires quick and precise actions to be taken. These quick reflexes that have their hands on the controls and eyes on the game is teaching them hand/eye coordination skills, as well as improving their motor skills.
4. Prompts Creativity and Imagination
Minecraft lets you build whatever you can imagine. Some project designs take more skills, however, the possibilities of building what you want are endless. With this much free reign of design control, your children are using their imaginations to build castles, treehouses, farms, cities, and whatever else they can come up with. This is literally art in digital form and opens up their minds to the possibilities. Not only that, but creativity fosters problem-solving skills, logic and critical thinking skills. Kids who learn to be creative tend to figure out their own ways to do things in everyday life.
5. Influences Teamwork
Minecraft has no set rules of who you can play and work with during the game. However, children learn that projects get done with four kids faster than it would with one. They also know that defending their structures is easier when you have more than one person on your side. So it encourages you to form teams and learn to work together to solve a problem. In a world where many video games are played very few have children working together for a common cause. Minecraft teaches that cooperation can lead to everyone winning. And in the eyes of parents that is a win-win.
6. Boosts Perception Skills
You may think that by playing video games, all your kid is getting is too much screen time. You also might think their understanding and perception of the real world is lacking. However, research suggests that some video games, including Minecraft improves visuospatial attention skills in children. This means it is encouraging them to perceive things in the real world and to find solutions to everyday problems. Overall, it gives them a new outlook on the real world, even while playing a make-believe video game.
7. Encourages Planning and Goal Setting
Minecraft encourages children to perform several tasks at once, while planning out future projects and ways to implement them into the game. Children have a concept of what they want or what they plan to do, and they work toward achieving that goal. This crosses over to real, everyday goal planning. Once they learn things take patience, hardwork, and dedication to achieve, they learn how to set goals and achieve them. This is not a bad thing. Almost any future endeavor your child may have will require setting a goal to achieve. So implementing this into a game is pretty amazing.
Overall, Minecraft teaches our kids social, cognitive and daily living skills all while they are playing a video game. It gives them practical math skills, reading readiness, hand/eye coordination, and so much more. Who would have thought such a video game, with cubes and blocks could be so very beneficial to our youth? It just goes to show you if you look at both sides of the coin, you can usually find some positive outcomes. Go ahead, let your kids have a little screen time tonight. Maybe they will learn a thing or two.
