This is a sponsored post. All opinions are my own.
Something I learned as a teenager is that you can't learn everything from books. I personally was a very sheltered child growing up. I went to the private school where there really wasn't anything bad going on and lived in a gated community with my parents. Overall life was safe and comfortable. And at school I was very smart with what I had learned in books. But when I finally got out into the real world, I had a lot of trouble with decision making. I had no idea the type of consequences that could happen from certain decisions. Mostly because since I was so sheltered, I was never taught about the outside world, away from the bubble I lived in.
Since we home-school Mary, I always knew I didn't want her to end up like I was when I finally got out on my own. But home-schooling can make it hard to teach kids about decision making too since usually you learn about this from having "street smarts" and getting into everyday situations. But there's a great new resource for kids, home-schooled or not, that can help them learn how to make decisions wisely and it's in the form of a game.
The game is Quandary and it's a free online game that kids can play to learn about how certain decisions can effect others. Players lead a new human colony on a distant planet. They must make difficult decisions in which there are no clear right or wrong answers but important consequences – to themselves, to others in the colony and to the planet Braxos. Players develop skills such as critical thinking, perspective-taking and decision-making. Quandary provides a framework for how to approach ethical decision-making without telling players what to think.
Mary and I sat down together this weekend to try out Quandary and we both really enjoyed it. I was interested to see her answers to the questions, along with what she believed would be a good solution to the problems. We both also really liked how there weren't any clear cut right or wrong answers too. That made her think for herself even more which was great!
- Perspective-taking: Quandary helps put players in others’ beliefs, preferences, attitudes, and condition -- a core social skill.
- Critical thinking: Critical thinking and reflection is associated ethical reasoning. The game calls on players to co-ordinate concepts or statements in complex ways and receive input and feedback from characters in the game.
Quandry is very impressive since it not only makes you think of consequences but you have to put yourself into "other people's shoes" to see how they will feel too.
Overall I can't wait to see more situations uploaded to the game since we already played the original 3!
CONVERSATION