Active Gaming: The Future of Play?

The authors examine technology-driven games--especially active gaming--as an evolving form of children's play. They offer an overview of play and its developmental benefits, describe the literature on the emergence of technology-driven play, and reflect on the diminishment of physical play in contemporary culture. They suggest that active gaming, which they describe in detail, not only meets the research-based definition of play, but also may fill the role of traditional play whose growing absence has left behind a vacuum.