Video games have traditionally been associated with sedentary lifestyles: a person watching a screen using only two hands. Nowadays, the number of children playing this type of game is increasing, and we can link this to the increasing number of children who are overweight and suffer from obesity. However, a New Generation of videogames includes sports games, dancing and other activities involving movement.
Physical Education teachers from La Devesa Bilingual School Carlet (Spain), have developed the innovation project “Kinect and Physical Education”. Microsoft Kinect sensor movement allows us to practise physical activity using videogames. So, our goal is to show sedentary students how to use videogames as a tool for a healthier lifestyle. During the first quarter of the project, the activity involved a pairs championship using “Kinect Adventures”, which allowed the students to work and improve strength, endurance, speed, coordination,…
“Physical active video games” mean a new way of understanding the relationship between video games and the health of young people, and that overcomes their main criticism, that video games represent sedentary behaviour. Possible benefits of physical active video games for the health of children and adolescents, shouldn’t only be preventive for welfare purposes, they also are tools for rehabilitation.
Definitely, the incorporation of physical activity video games has created a new way of understanding the relationship between this type of technological entertainment and young people’s health. We believe that video games can stop being a part of the problem, and become part of the answer.
“Interactive games are a good way to make a transition between being a sedentary guy with little physical activity and being a more active person.” Elizabeth DiRico
Vicent Gadea Mira