A gamer friend, Paulo, asked a question: “At what age is it best to start teaching kids board games?”
It’s a relevant question for parents, who want to equip their kids with desirable life skills. It’s also a delicate task, matching kids’ age to the proper game type.

ChildDevelopmentInfo.com has a lot of information on the different stages of a child’s learning. This article uses the stages mentioned there and matches them to games based on personal experience. An individual child’s development may vary so feel free to mix up the list as best fits.

Pre-operational Phase (2 – 4 years)

At this time toddlers are learning how to speak. Their vocabulary will likely be focused on themselves and the symbols around them, eager for interaction with people. It’s a great time to start exercising their memory muscles. I would recommend games similar to Monster Chase and Octo.

Intuitive Phase (4 – 7 years)

Kids at this stage like to make conversation. Why not direct their energy into something creative? Games that focus on storytelling and imagination would make marvels. Parents get to listen to their child paint elaborate worlds while adults get to correct grammar along the way.

Find out what stories kids came up with in this video at 1:00

Concrete Operations (7 – 12 years)

At this age, the little boys and girls are interested into anything related to play. They seek thematic games with miniatures, heroes and zombies. There are opportunities of learning from those types of games; I suggest squeezing in games that teach certain skills.

Straw – A simple card game where players take turns putting object cards of different weights on a camel’s back. The person who breaks the camel’s back by going over its weight limit loses and whoever has the highest total weight in their hand, wins.

Here’s the learning bit, when playing a card, one must add or subtract out loud with the running total. Straw is a fun game that doubles as good arithmetic practice.

Timeline – is a series of small games revolving around history; from various discoveries, innovations, and world events. Players attempt to place their card chronologically one at a time. First one to successfully play all their cards, wins.

Players learn history from this game just by practice. My gradeschool self would have found this game handy to get through my social science subjects.

Word on the Street – The game comes with a colourful cardboard street and a bunch of stone letter tiles. The different teams go back and forth spelling a word within the time limit. When spelling a word, teams slide the mentioned letters a step towards their side of the street. First team to reach capture 8 or more letters wins.

Formal Operations (12 years onward)

Our teens are headed to adulthood and will soon let go of the reins. We must be ready to change our controller’s hat to a coaching cap. The need for complex learning is increased each year; we parents must be creative and collaborative in assisting them.

Compounded – I’ve talked about this game in my previous article and I highly recommend teaching this game as early as possible. It teaches chemistry visually and physically, the tangible nature better facilitates recall on compound structures and elemental valence.

Games about planning and patience prove to be useful for adolescents. Games like Splendor, Power Grid, and Pandemic incite them to strategize, negotiate, cooperate and follow through their plans.

Dixit – a very intelligent artsy game, where the current leader gives out a clue and chooses an art card in his or her hand and plays it face down, other players then choose among their cards something related to that clue and play it face down as well. The cards are shuffled and players take a guess which card was the leader’s original pick.

In Dixit you try make a clue that is not too obvious. If everyone finds your card then you get no points, same in reverse, if no one is able to find your card, you score no points. It shines when you make a connection with your teen without anyone else getting it.

At this stage you need games that put value in spending time with family. Have a regular family game night to look forward to and see your family grow closer.

Until then, Keep on Playing!

Written by: Ronald Villaver
Edited by: Reg Tolentino