Are You a Guitar Hero?

I used to think video games were for kids. Of course, when I was a kid one of the most popular video games consisted of two white lines that could be maneuvered up and down (not sideways) to bounce a small white ball across the black screen of your television. Wow. Atari. What technology.

Soon, advancements were made and all of a sudden there were small outlines of white "aliens" that marched across a screen and could be shot down from below. Many was the wasted quarter spent playing that game for hours upon hours, because at that time there was no such thing as a Home Gaming System. Other favorites put poor chickens at risk who bravely tried time after time (sometimes unsuccessfully) to cross the road, and crazy caterpillars who could clone themselves and wind their way through a maze from the top of a screen to the bottom. Kids today don't know how good they have it.

This brings me to my main point. I am 41 years old and a complete Guitar Hero/Rock Band fan. During my formative years in my small town, my best friend and I were just sure that someone would come discover our hidden musical talents and whisk us away to Los Angeles, where we would rub elbows with the likes of David Lee Roth and Tom Petty. This, my friends, is the mentality that causes middle-aged adults like me to spend our hard-earned money on these games . They help us, in a way, realize our rock star fantasy. Here we are, fully established, stable citizens, and we spend (a portion of) our free time jamming out on a little plastic device, under the delusion that we are actually making real music. Our living rooms have become a stage--we sing, we dance, we play guitar, and most of all, we have a blast. When I was young, 40 seemed unimaginably old, but luckily the birth of such technology has granted us the opportunity to shave off a few years, seeming so much younger than our parents did at our age.

As teachers, it allows us yet another opportunity to relate to our students. I even know of music programs in certain schools that use said video games to enhance student understanding of rhythm. How much more fun is that than singing 60's folksongs from a spiral songbook while the music teacher pounds out accompaniment on the piano?

Perhaps, though, it is the invention of these games that causes kids to become bored with school so quickly. How can the classroom teacher compete? We have only our wit and sparkling personalities to keep our students awake and alert the majority of the school day. What gets us through, however, is knowing that eventually there will be a snow day or vacation day and we can spend it as Judy Nails, Pandora, or Steven Tyler.