At Renaissance Adventures, our live-action roleplaying games focus on the development of what we call "21st century skills." These are the kinds of skills that are important for kids to know in this day and age, and in fact are often unsupported in the school system or other institutions. The 21st century skills we are talking about are: ethical reasoning, fitness, fun, self-esteem, critical thinking, teamwork, and social skills. The acronym is: EFFECTS.One of these EFFECTS outcomes is fitness, and I ran across a great blog entry by Matthew Squire: by a roleplaying gamer that understands the crucial need for fitness in today's youth. Here is a snippet:
What does it mean to be fit? Is it being able to peddle on an exercise bike or walk on a tread mill? Is it being able to run 10 miles? We often forget what fitness meant in the days of old...
Still more in this day and age one doesn’t have to do any physical activity at all. We drive to work, drive to the grocery store, and then home again. Sit in front of the computer or around a gaming table with friends and imagine doing physical activity. We make our characters jump and run (all while doing the most complex of gymnastic back flips) to their goal. The goal is always some item or power that makes our characters stronger.
We, the supposed masters of our characters, get weaker as our characters get stronger. It’s as if we are giving our life energy to them one sugary game table snack at a time...Furthermore, in another blog entry, he goes on to describe how a live-action roleplaying game such as ours might be able to integrate exercise as a game mechanic in the quest.
Here are his two blog articles. Enjoy!
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