Being a classroom teacher, I communicate daily with students, parents, and colleagues. But as I get older, I don’t seek out many new socializing opportunities. I am okay spending more time at home with family and less time filling weekends with social activities. We have a small group of close friends that we see, but outside of this (and our extended family) it is the three of us. In the past, this has worked well for my son. Socializing is exhausting to him…it’s like kickboxing is for most. He needs a lot of down time during the weekend to recover and to prepare for the upcoming week.
Because I’m not craving new social experiences, I’m not the mom that is going to go through the class list and set up 3 playdates for the week. I have tried this in the past, and then I regret the over scheduled week. I feel the desire to cancel plans or go into the playdate expecting a miserable outcome. This summer, we tried a totally different approach. No camps or excessive scheduling. My son and I both loved it. But our almost hermit status will need to come to an end and we are both going to have to brush up on our social skills in order to make it in the outside world. So I begin slowly…
Maybe we could have someone meet us at the school for a play date?
No, thank you.
What about Brendan?
What would be the point? He’s moving to another school.
You could still play with him. You seemed to enjoy him during the year.
No, thank you.
You know that there will be new kids in your class this year, right?
Yes.
I wonder if we go to the park or the school playground if we might meet any of them?
How about we play with that kid that I met on the server?
Well…that would be nice, but he lives in Texas. So…that’s not happening.
I know…why don’t we go get a cool drink & then come back home and watch a show.
I think to myself, that sounds perfect to me…especially if you were a 45 year old man that already had a life time of playing outside, riding bikes & doing squirt gun fights. I hope that he has some of those childhood experiences that I remember so fondly, but I don’t know that he will. It is a different time. We don’t see kids playing kickball in the street and honestly, he doesn’t seem interested in the neighborhood kids his age.
So as parents…we think…and we brainstorm. We decided that our best bet would be to find kids that have a passion for Mine Craft and try to build relationships that way. I guess it is a bit like dating, right?! You are told to do things that you love and then you will find people that have similar interests as you. So we decided to look for “blind date opportunities” for my 7-year-old. Strictly platonic, but using the same principle.
I got on the internet and started looking for groups that get together and play Mine Craft. I obviously didn’t word my search well, because I came up with a list of meeting places and times…all taking places in bars. Obviously, that won’t work. So we will continue to look for a Crafting group that aren’t adults….which is harder than I expected.
If you have a child that is addicted to Mine Craft…PLEASE let me know! We will be waiting by the computer! 🙂
My Twice Baked Potato 
This might sound weird but my son loves weapons. I could apologize but I won’t because I think it’s fairly normal!! The last two summers he has had so much fun with a little knife sharpening sticks that we searched for. We gave him different yarns and he has created the coolest swords, bow and arrows (dowels) and they actually work! Seeing him be creative is amazing. Im not saying we don’t have our computer battles but this worked. This might not be for eveyone and we monitor him while reading or chating but it works. He spent days doing this detoxing from electronics. He LOVES Minecraft but this seems to be an equal interest for us.
Very cool!! My love/hate relationship with Mine Craft continues. I have seen some amazing growth in some areas largely because of the game; however, I am always eager when he shows interest in other topics!
Good luck forming a mine craft group.
Thank you! Isn’t that funny…until injust read your comment, I didn’t think about US trying to form a small kids group of Crafters! Nice comments lead to nice changes! 😉
My just-turned-9-year-old loves Minecraft and would love to find others to play with (we just had a Minecraft LAN party for his birthday). I’m struggling with this, however, because his love seems to be quickly turning into addiction and I’m not sure whether we should encourage his interest (and the social relations he might be able to build through it)…or whether we’re going to need to cut him off completely to prevent him from going off the deep end (he’s becoming increasingly desperate for screen time and we’re having multiple meltdowns every day lately when he reaches the end of his time or we threaten to end or suspend it because of discipline issues).
Elizabeth-I understand your concerns completely!! Honestly, my son plays more than I like, but it has been a great incentive to complete and do other things. We have a visual timer that helps. It is a very addicting game, but on the positive side my son has learned lots of new vocabulary and problem solving skills.
Elizabeth-if you DO decide to let your son play, let me know! We can tell you which server we play and our game avatar name 😉
We’re experimenting with an hour a day for now. Would love to join your son within that constraint. You can contact me directly at zilf@leapinliz.com with details. Also, my son would like to know which version of the game you’re playing.