Way back when my kids were younger, we devoted an evening or two a week to playing board games.  (Many of your kids have been deluged with such games for their XMas gifts, I’m sure.)  And, we played the games I learned when I was a tyke when traveling in the car.

Which always created a tension- should we let the kids win or not?  (Just so you know, shrinks nowadays say no- once your child is four or older.)   But, we modified the games to match their capabilities so they could win- on their own terms.

I was taught two car games as a kid.  Ones that requires no board, no cards, and were fully transportable.  Ghost and Geography.

Ghost is a simple game.  The way I was taught was every person in the car got to choose a letter- and worked hard to NOT spell out a word (four or more letters) when it was their turn.  The problem was taking into account all the possible words.  After all, when you want to spell tentacle- the word tent appears first.  Oops.  You get a G (or an H or an O or S or T).  The last person to get “GHOST” wins.

But, when my kids were younger, I wanted them to learn to spell.  So, I modified the game.  (Thankfully, there is no Hoyle’s Book of Rules that I transgressed.)  The goal was to HAVE the word end on them- and 3 letter words were valid.  Plus,  the first person to get GHOST would win. So, they learned to spell cat, dog, home, car, etc.   As they got older, we switched back to the rules I learned as a kid.

Geography is a similar construct.  Here, one chooses a city, town, nation, continent, ocean, lake, river- any geographically identified entity.  And, the next person has to choose a place that starts with the last letter of the place that was just picked.  (No repeats were allowed, of course.) Of course, this led to the kids learning as many “A” places as they could, since so many places end with A.  America, Africa. Asia, Antigua, etc.  As my kids got older, they demanded that I be limited to a state- so they could have a better chance at winning.  (Yes, I memorized Volume 18 of my Grolier’s Encyclopedia when I was younger- the Gazette volume- so I could beat my parents.)

At home, I also modified other games I had learned to love as a child.  Like Casino, a card game that teaches math and logic skills.  Where everyone gets four cards- even the “table”.  And, you can match what’s on the table (a 6 in your hand and on the table or a king in both, etc.)- or add cards, by putting an ace on a 6 to make 7.  But, that’s iffy, since you have to hope no one else has a 7 before your next turn (since only one card can be used per play).    The goal was to win the most cards, the most spades, the 10 of hearts and the 2 of diamonds- for a total of 21 points.  (Winning [reaching 21] would take a series of deals, when there are three or more folks playing.)

But, as the kids aged, we needed to make the game harder.  So, it became Casino ‘to lose’.  Where you wanted to get the fewest cards, no spades, no 10 of hearts, no 2 of diamonds.   But, you had to take what matched between your hand and the table or made the sum.  (We also play subtraction instead of addition.)

And, my favorite game.  Scrabble.  A game I play to this very day- against a computer programmed to be a “PhD” in English.  But, to make the board game fun for my kids, the rules were adjusted.  When they were really little, I had to score thrice their total or they won.  As they grew up, the tally dropped to twice.

Sure, we played Monopoly, Sorry, Chutes and Ladders, Parcheesi (pachisi), Chinese Checkers, Gin Rummy, and Clue, too.  Where we taught the kids strategy so they could win and play effectively, too.  Because the idea behind the games was fun AND learning.  Not winning, per se, although that provided benefits to our kids, too.

There was no need to throw the game- and our kids learned the concept of fairness.  (As I explained in my post of a few weeks ago, there’s a vast difference between equality and fairness.)

So, take out that games you got your kids for Christmas.  And teach them the value of play, fun, and fairness, too.

And, keep your kids’ minds active in the car with Geography and Ghost, too.

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