Why Co-operative games for Home Schooling?

Co-operative games produce less aggressive behaviors during and after play and, that as a result, they require less direct supervision by the teachers, it’s a win/win. Read more below…

Games to Develop Thinking Skills:

Gridlock: Two games in one! Inspired by the puzzles you played with as a child, in which you slide pieces around to get the alphabet in the right order.

GRIDLOCK JR: There is a huge Traffic Jam. You must direct the traffic to get the Fire Truck to the Fire, the Police Car to the Crime Scene, the Ambulance to the Accident and the Mayor’s Limo to the Airport.

GRIDLOCK SR: Challenges have been added to make the Traffic Jam harder to solve. No Stopping and Stop signs are present to complicate matters. Vehicle breakdowns can occur as well. Add in Time pressure too.

And, if you are really on top of your game, can you get the other vehicles back to their parking spots by day’s end? With teamwork, maybe…!

Maze: An intricate strategy game with the flavor of chess. But, to win the game, players must work out a common strategy to get all their ‘Mates’ home. If they try using their minds as weapons against each other, they soon lose.

Pieces have individual moving patterns to yield a fresh game each time. Mental wizards can make combinations, study end games, and set up problems, while beginners can play an easy introductory game.

Zen Blocks: Our cube game for thinking and intuitive players.

Symbols on the blocks are matched to form a cube, like dominoes in 3-D. Easy games for the young to try, and tough games for teens and adults. Not a one solution puzzle, but a genuine game that unfolds differently each time. Excellent for family play, in schools as a logic game, by groups assessing co-operative skills or just as a gift for that clever person. Can you bring together the opposites to form a complete whole? Full explanations of the meanings of the symbols are given.

Brainy Games: These are 3 logic games for the clever to enjoy. Each game features a unique Flipping Strategy to keep you on your mental tiptoes and wanting to play the games over and over. Not for the faint-minded.
[add_to_cart id=”1533″ style=”border:1px solid #000; padding: 5px; margin-top:10px;”]Blues Away: THE IDEA: Taking turns, players use the Yellow “Happy Days” marble to jump and remove as many of the “Blues” marbles as they can.

Marbles are rolled randomly out to start each game. Thus a new challenge each time. Some logic, some intuition, lots of brainwork, because no Luck is involved.

So Play, and let Sunny Ways chase the Blues away Today!

Diplomatic Mission: The battlegrounds are quiet, but full of tension. One false move, a deliberate or accidental casualty, and hostilities will be renewed. Then the game is declared Lost.

To win, a lasting peace must be made. To realize that objective, the players each send out a team of Diplomats to each other’s Castles to secure the respective Royal Signatures and Seals on the Peace Documents.

Players must use all their mental and negotiation skills to move the Diplomats through the respective Territories.

Warp n Woof: Players must carefully weave their pieces past each other to Home (the opposite corner). A traffic jam will lose the game for everyone. Tactics involve self-sacrifice, luck of the dice and cleverness in using the opportunities that Chance provides.

The game has the ‘feel’ of backgammon. For younger players, set it up with fewer pieces. For serious strategists, the game can be recorded as you delve into the intricate world of openings, and mid and endgame tactics.

Why Co-operative games for Home Schooling?

Games make learning fun. But competitive games pit learners against each other, so someone always ends up feeling bad, or left out.

Play as friends, not as enemies! Our games foster the spirit of co-operation. Players help each other climb a mountain, make a community, bring in the harvest, complete a space exploration… They are never against each other.

After all, the initial impulse to play a game is social; that is, we bring out a game because we want to do something together. How ironic then that in most games, we spend all our efforts trying to bankrupt someone, destroy their armies — in other words, to get rid of one another! We soon learn how to pick on the other person’s weaknesses in order to win the game.

In sharing and working together teacher and students foster a sense of community. When there are no winners and losers, aggressive behavior decreases and less time is wasted sorting out disputes.

Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis actually investigated the effects of competitive and cooperative games on aggressive and cooperative behaviors of 70 children (4 to 5 years old) from four classes in three preschools using some of our games including Max®, Harvest Time®, Granny’s House®, and Sleeping Grump® and some of our Cooperative Physical Activities).

The key conclusions of the study are that co-operative games produce less aggressive behaviors during and after play and, that as a result, they require less direct supervision by the teachers, it’s a win/win. It could be argued that they would pay for themselves in saved teacher work-hours.