Sometimes Video Games are A OK

Both of my boys are football lovers--guess you can say it runs in the family.  But football is kind of a tough game to grasp for younger kids, lets say 7 and under.  There are rules and regs, penalties, challenges, loss of down, third-down conversions---real strategy. 

My oldest, who is 14, not only plays the game himself (awesome middle linebacker) but he loves to play Madden Football on his Playstation game system.  Well, his little brother, age 7, started watching him play about a year ago.  The more he watched this game, because it is EXACTLY played out like a real game, the more he understood football, the players, their positions, etc.  Soon he requested his own Madden game, and for Christmas, they both got the 2010 version of Madden football.

So what?  Another video game to keep kids on the couch?  Not even.  My 7 year old son learned stats--which requires math skills. He practices drills with his NFL Nerf football on a daily basis in the living room--not exactly a couch potato.  He collects cards and organizes them by team or team colors or whatever--but he's sorting and using patterns.  He asks to play "name that football team" on drives in the car which enhances all of our memories.  He lives and breaths football, right along with Star Wars and Legos and stuffed animals.  And where last season he passed on signing up for Flag Football, my guess is next Fall he won't, and it might just be his video game that inspired him onto the field.