POKEMON CAN BE COOL!!
Written: Jun 16 '00
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Product Rating:
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Pros: teaches many skills
Cons: not enough parents are involved.
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| pantazis5's Full Review: Archived Kids & Family Reviews |
Note: I would like every parent who has actually gotten involved with the Pokemon game and learned to play it to reply to this opinion with a comment.
My children and I began collecting Pokemon cards before they became a craze. We are a collecting type of family and for us the Pokemon cards were cool. We started with one simple pack of cards. We learned about them from the pack and we saw the check list and decided to buy some more. Which we did. My son and daughter and I put together a binder and we got baseball card pages and we went through the checklists and we put the names of the Pokemon card that we were missing in each sleeve. As we got them we would discard the piece of paper with the name on it. We learned more and more and more about Pokemon as we collected the cards.
Then they hit, and everyone wanted them. My children and I had been struggling to learn to play the game and had not been successful with the directions. We went to Toys R Us and they had people there who taught us how to play. It is a very difficult game to understand at first. It uses high level thinking skills, math skills. To play the game you need to be able to read. My 5 year old struggled with it because he could not read. My 7 year old learned it and we play it together.
Even my mother (fjbpab) got into the Pokemon game and we started playing it on her dining room table. She set up binders for the kids and went on collecting trips with us.
As our collection of doubles grew we wondered what to do with them. We had 5 CHARZARDS, the Most wanted card of all time. We certainly did not need 5 of them.
My children, my mother and I set up a road side stand in front of my home and we began selling and trading Pokemon cards with the neighborhood kids. Day after day the number of kids coming to my home grew and grew. We met literally hundreds of children. We all talked about Pokemon. The kids thought it was awesome, a MOM who knew about Pokemon. I had High school kids coming to wheel and deal with me.
I had trading rules, and the kids truly respected my rules. My main rule was that we would not trade unless the child could show he had doubles of a card. Also the trade had to be a fair trade.
My children sold their double cards for 75 cents a piece. They made 350.00 last summer and collected the entire set.
They learned to count change. They learned to play fair, they learned not to take advantage and they learned a new game. They learned MANY skills from our venture into Pokemon. My children ALSO made MANY new friends by my getting involved with this. My son is starting school in the fall and he knows all of the children in the neighborhood now. They also know him and think he is pretty cool.
The younger children with Pokemon cards are PREY to the older ones. The older ones can talk the little ones out of the best cards. My son checked with me on every trade. We talked about it and we discussed whether it was good or bad. Some of the little ones are so happy to get the attention of the older ones that they are just plain willing to trade anything. I met many children who had lost their cards to older kids, or who had taken advantage of a younger child. I had the opportunity to talk with many of the older kids who took advantage and with the younger ones who end up losing. The majority of the kids I spoke with told me that their parents hated Pokemon.
I believe that parents hate Pokemon because they DO NOT UNDERSTAND IT. Yes there are bad values attached to Pokemon. So that is where parents need to turn it around and teach the good values using the bad. Get involved. You cannot shield your children from Pokemon. It is everywhere.
I applaud Toys R Us for teaching the kids to play. I realize that they do it to make money by selling more Pokemon related merchandise, however, it also serves a wonderful service to children. They learn the rules. Even Pokemon has rules.
How many parents out there are complaining that their young child lost all of his cards to the older kids? Well if parents got involved and taught the trading rules to their children and watched to make sure the older kids didnt take advantage then that would not have happened to your child. How many of your children went to school last year and had their cards stolen from their desks? I need to ask you...WHY DID THEY HAVE THEM IN SCHOOL IN THE FIRST PLACE???
We closed our stand last fall when school started. I told my children that Pokemon and school did not mix. The word was out that the stand would reopen when school was out. The kids have already started coming back. Asking me about the Fossil sets and the different cards to collect. Wanting my opinion on the trades they got into during the school year. Often they tell my children how cool it is that their mother will trade with them.
I even have had a few parents ask me for Pokemon advice. My main advice to any parent...get involved. Go to Toys R Us yourself and learn how to play. Then sit down and play the game with a child. You will not believe how rewarding it can be.
Recommended:
No
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pantazis5
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 - Top 500 |
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Location: New Hampshire
Reviews written: 335
Trusted by: 223 members
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Life is a banquet and most people are starving to death!
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