In this “block shaped” game you can spend countless hours fighting against mobs like creepers, endermen and zombies, you can build houses and other constructs, or discover the vast landscape of this strange looking game that doesn’t seem make any sense at first, but it’s super fun. Minecraft is played by people of probably all kinds of ages, from children, to teenagers and even adults. Yes, including me. I love making time for this game from time to time.
Minecraft has been very popular for many years and still is. This is also the case with children and it really shows in different types of stores (e.g., H&M, C&A, KKEC, etc.) selling Minecraft merchandise. But is this iconic game likely to affect kids? Or could it even be educational?
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Addicted to Minecraft? 7 Symptoms
So how do you know if you’re addicted to Minecraft? Reflect and see if you can identify one of the following symptoms of gambling addiction:
How do you play Minecraft?
Minecraft was designed on the concept of freedom. There are no specific goals for players to achieve, and no right or wrong way to play. This gives players the opportunity to use their creativity to build anything they can imagine in the virtual world.
Players start the game by creating a character and then are free to explore the infinite world of Minecraft. The game consists of cubes that represent different materials, such as earth, stone, water and lava. Players can tear down these cubes and use them to build anything they can imagine.
Is it safe to play Minecraft?
Being a single player game, Minecraft is distinct from its multiplayer counterpart, which is also distinct from its multiplayer counterpart.
Minecraft is a safe game for children as it is a one-on-one game. Of course, this assumes parents have taken the necessary steps to prevent their children from gaining unauthorized access to multiplayer games. For those who detest violence in video games, this one has you covered thanks to its non-violent difficulty setting.
Losing track of time
Since Minecraft is a game with no limits, it can be easy to get lost and keep track of time while you’re playing it. Parents of Minecrafters have a major bone to pick with the amount of time their kids spend playing games or browsing YouTube and streaming vlogs of famous Minecrafters. The more time the child spends in a virtual world, the more difficult it will be to stay in touch with the reality of the real world. Spending time on a game that doesn’t really challenge your child’s intelligence can make them feel adjusted to mediocrity and confined to their comfort zones.
It’s a bit like a bird that constantly feeds its chicks to the point where the chicks don’t learn to hunt for their own food or fly out of the nest. A rather hyperbolic comparison for video game effects, but anything to make a point. Different effects on students of different learning modalities. While Minecraft is increasingly being used in educational settings, it’s important to be sensitive to the adaptivity and unique learning styles of different students. With most schools running online these days, Minecraft has become a useful learning tool with many teachers incorporating it into their curriculum. Depending on how the child learns, it can be a great advantage or completely useless. Kinesthetic learners (these people learn by doing, acting out, experimenting with a concept) benefit substantially from using Minecraft to learn concepts of resource management, resource allocation, budgeting etc. However, this may not benefit visual learners (people who learn by seeing, visualizing etc..) as much. Auditory learners (people who learn by listening) and tactile learners (those who learn by writing and keeping documents, etc.) are at the most disadvantaged when learning via Minecraft.