lifestyle

Japanese educators call for twice monthly No Video Game Days

9 Comments
By RocketNews24

Compared to some other countries, video games enjoy a fairly high standing in Japanese society. Nintendo’s Mario is seen by many as not only a symbol of wholesome fun, but an example of how innovation and craftsmanship can lead to sustained economic prosperity. The world of Final Fantasy isn’t just a great setting for an epic quest, but for lunch or dinner, and some particularly stylish game characters even go on to leave their mark on real-world fashion.

Still, not everyone in Japan is a fan of video gaming. The Hokkaido Board of Education would rather see kids with schoolbooks or fishing poles in their hands than game controllers, and to that end is calling for parents to institute twice monthly No Game Days, and not just for the kids in the family.

In recent scholastic tests, students from Hokkaido, Japan’s rural, sparsely populated northern island, earned lower scores than the Japanese national average. Since the simplest tactic for obtaining high test scores is to throw more time at studying, the Board of Education figured some other activity must be taking time away from studying, and came to the conclusion that video games are one of the culprits.

In response, the Board is asking households to declare the first and third Monday of each month No Game Days. The suggested restriction isn’t limited to kids with exams to study for, either, as the board is recommending that adults, too, abstain from playing video games on those days.

The Board made its statement last week, which would make the first proposed No Game Day February 2. To help further bolster support for the practice, a number of local events are being planned for the preceding Sunday, with snow rafting and fishing activities scheduled in various parts of Hokkaido.

Board member and Lifelong Learning Division head Shinsuke Asai described the initiative’s overall purpose as to “put in place a desirable lifestyle through distancing children from video games and increasing the learning experiences they have with their family circle and friends.” While the end goal itself is admirable, and many online applauded the decision to stage outdoor events on February 1, the No Game Day idea didn’t sit particularly well with gamers, who offered the following comments.

“Can’t they just make the school days longer?” “I think the real problem is irresponsible parents.” “Geez, this again?” “They should take cell phones away from junior high and elementary kids before worrying about games.”

The last point is particularly telling, as it shows that video games are far from the only distraction children need to learn to resist and/or manage in order to thrive scholastically. Particularly as children enter their teens, they show an increasing interest in social media, which can consume just as much time as video games. The concept that restricting games twice a month, while leaving other hobbies unchecked, will result in superior test scores seems like wishful thinking, especially as it fails to take into account the child’s individual circumstances which would determine whether the first and third Mondays of the month are indeed the most appropriate days on which to drop the hammer.

Moreover, if one of the major goals of the No Game Day initiative is to increase the amount of time the family spends together, doesn’t that also necessitate restricting parents’ leisure activities that don’t contribute to their children’s mental development? There’s no point in formalizing a No Game Day for more family time without pairing it with a No Drinking with Coworkers Day or No Watching Trendy TV Dramas Recorded over the Weekend Day.

Actually, those sort of non-productive pastimes are probably holding adults back from reaching their societal potential just like video games keep kids from being all that they can be intellectually. Of course, the difference is that adults are supposed to have better time management skills and a stronger concept of moderation.

As we’ve seen before, though, reaching legal adulthood doesn’t magically provide you the gift of intelligence or even basic common sense. Time management skills are something that have to be learned through practice and actual use. Just surviving until they graduate from high school won’t teach kids how to manage their time, especially if they’ve been coddled until then with blanket restrictions that remove personal responsibility from the equation.

Sources: NHK, Hachima Kiko

Read more stories from RocketNews24. -- Japanese newspaper’s parenting tips include breaking your kids’ toys -- Study reveals too much Internet and video games is bad for your grades -- Nagano legislators propose banning morning practice for middle school athletes

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9 Comments
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The last paragraph says it all. Such control produces non-thinking adults.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

Why not just an old school method that seemed to work in my day? It was called a "time limit". If you can enforce a "no game day" then a time limit should be possible. Actually it would be much better than a "no game day". "No game day" sounds so much like you're preventing addiction. A time limit of games, net and TV would be more of a "better lifestyle" sort of thing... What do you think?

5 ( +5 / -0 )

Twice-a-month days seems useless. Try twice-a-month No Video Game weeks. But don't tell the kids it was my idea.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

How about 'No Screen Saturday' (or Sunday) - no TV, games, social media or (gasps) JT?

2 ( +2 / -0 )

I predict high absenteeism on those days.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Why can't we choose our own days?

0 ( +0 / -0 )

In recent scholastic tests, students from Hokkaido, Japan’s rural, sparsely populated northern island, earned lower scores than the Japanese national average. Since the simplest tactic for obtaining high test scores is to throw more time at studying, the Board of Education figured some other activity must be taking time away from studying, and came to the conclusion that video games are one of the culprits.

So in other words, when faced with an embarrassing inadequacy in their department, rather than objectively study the problem to determine the real cause for the inadequacy, they just decided kids needed to study more and blamed video games? As in, they never bothered to check if their own educational policies and practices or some factor relevant to Hokkaido compared to other prefectures were factors, they just jumped to blame video games no questions asked?

Gee, with with luminaries in rational thought like that as role-models and at the helm of local education, it's ENTIRELY BAFFFLING how Hokkaido children might not be learning as well as children in other parts of Japan.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

"To help further bolster support for the practice, a number of local events are being planned for the preceding Sunday, with snow rafting and fishing activities scheduled"

Don't they have snow rafting and fishing video games?

1 ( +1 / -0 )

I live in a small town in Hokkaido, My Children go to a School that has only 53 kids so pretty small and most of the kids including my son either play sport or have piano dance or swimming lessons that take up most afternoons so playing video games doesn't affect study time but sport does. Although I am not sure how much more study they would like the kids to do as everyday their is always plenty of homework to be done including on weekends and holidays so I think the kids study more than enough, maybe the problem is more in the Teaching methods than the after School study time, my kids are Aussies and they attend Local Public Schools and they are not struggling at School, most likely it's because the Teachers have time to spend on each child because of the small class sizing of under 10 children per class versus the City Schools with over 30 kids per class.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

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