Happy Birthday, now get out of the house
How young is too young for a games console? Adam Turner argues that five is too young for the console-fest to begin.
It's my son's fifth birthday this week. He's all grown up now and ready for school next year. He loves to run around, to sing and dance about to his favourite music. He loves to play on the swings in the backyard and in the new cubby house. He also loves to watch television and play computer games, but so far I've resisted the urge to buy him a games console.
I recently hired a Nintendo Wii for the weekend and we had lots of fun playing Mario Kart and jumping around in front of the television playing tennis. I made it clear it was only on loan, but he was still sad to see it go. In my opinion, five is too young to sit around the house playing computer games all day when you should be running around in the fresh air.
We've long had household rules about how much television my son and his little sister watch each day. When he discovered computer games, such as Dora the Explorer on the Nick Jnr site, he quickly decided they were more fun than watching Dora on television. The rules about television watching were soon extended to computer games to ensure he didn't park himself in front of a screen for hours at a time.
I realise I need to lead by example here. I've always said never trust a skinny technology reviewer - it means they're not doing the hard yards sitting on their arse playing with new tech. I've decided I don't want this on my tombstone - we'll not anytime soon anyway.
For my son's third birthday I bought him a present - a treadmill. Actually the treadmill is for me but the gift is to my family - there's no point in seeking home entertainment nerdvana if you don't live long enough to enjoy it. The treadmill doesn't get used at much as it should, maybe I should pimp it out with a wide screen TV, surround sound and internet access.
I'm not a luddite or some right-wing game-bashing nut. One day I'll cave in and buy a games console, but not until my son's old enough to understand the concept of moderation (maybe I'm expecting too much, as it's a concept many adults seem to struggle with). Maybe he can earn his pocket money helping me review games, which would surely be a dream gig for a teenager. Until then, I'd prefer that he get out of the house.
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