Games + Puzzles and Child Development

I often wonder about child psychology and how a child’s brain develops. Knowing that these early years have a profound impact on later years, I always think ahead about how I’ll treat my children.

Looking back, and this is only based on my personal opinion, the games and puzzles that I played during childhood. I think… again, I stress that “I think” these have played a big role in the way I think (for better or worse?).

Chess: Strategy, definitely this helped me to think a few steps in advance. Trying to predict the opposition’s every move. It also helped in teaching me how to bluff and reading into the opponent’s face.

Spot the Difference: Awareness and alertness are the by-product of playing this game. I still remember playing it with my grandfather Baba Naser (God rest his soul). And the element of time and competition also makes this whole process faster and forces the brain to process information quicker.

Memory Card Game: You know this one right? Lay out a deck of cards (or two) and try to guess and then remember positions of the cards, two of the same makes a point… etc. etc. do I need to say which part of the brain this helped? Cooking? No seriously, memory. A good memory is definitely one of my strong points. I remember every KD I lent to people (I’m kidding, I’m not stingy… but really… the two people I gave Laptops to, you owe me 260 KD and 230 KD… you know yourselves)

Stories: My father, every Thursday night on the drive back from chalet to home, used to tell us stories, and they’d continue from week to the next, sometimes lasting a month or so. I remember those stories would leave me marveled, enchanted, in a hazy day dream the next Friday. The whole atmosphere, the night ride back, the darkness and the empty highways, staring outside the car window and watching the highway lights flashing by, was just soil for enchantment. (I think I’ve covered this idea in a previous post, a good book to read about this is USES OF ENCHANTMENT). If I can factor out one thing that contributed most to my child like imagination which is with me to this day (and might be the largest contributing factor to my creativity) then it would be those Thursday night stories.

Kout Bu 6: I’m kidding…

Word Games: Scramble, Hangman, crosswords and other word games I wasn’t particularly into, I think they would have helped my vocabulary if I did play them when I was a child.

Are there any other games that might have helped in the development of us children? Please let me know your opinions and feedback regarding this.