When I completed treatment for medulloblastoma almost 4 years ago, I had a concentration span of about 30 minutes on a good day. I read an article on games like sudoku slowing the progress of Alzheimer's disease and started reading more about brain injury and recovery.
I started playing logic games about 3 years ago, and my concentration levels have returned to close to where they were before treatment. It's well known that damaged brain cells cannot be restored, but what many people don't realise is that you can create new pathways in previously unused braincells. Any new activity will create a new pathway in your brain, and repeating this activity strengthens this pathway. Playing is how children's brains develop, so it makes sense that playing would work for adults and older children too. When you first play a new game, your have to concentrate to learn the rules and how to play. After you've played a few times, it gets easier, and eventually you start playing on auto-pilot - very little concentration is then needed to play. When you reach this stage it's time to switch to the next level or a new game.
Here are some tips to increase your brain power by playing logic games
- Start each day with a 20-30 minute brain workout. Sitting on an exercise ball while you play gives you double benefit as the cerebellum is worked out at the same time and can help with balance issues.
- Get 5 or 6 good quality logic games (see below for descriptions of some great games) and alternate them. I played one game a week, after 6 weeks I'd start the first game again at the next level. The benefit of this is that you need to concentrate to remember how to play the game, and you are now playing at a more difficult level.
- Make sure you set a time limit, most games will allow you to save the game and continue later. The games are very addictive, and I find I could play all day if I allowed myself to. 30 minutes is a good limit, anything more than an hour leaves me feeling a bit fuzzy headed. A whole day makes me loose the ability to speak in full sentences and is not recommended
- Keep a sudoku or crossword puzzle book in your bag. That way you can get in a few minutes of brain workout while waiting at doctors appointments or other times when there isn't much to do.
Everett Kaser and Kris Pixton have some very good games that can be downloaded on a try-before-you-buy basis. These are my 5 favorites:
- LOOPical - LOOPical is a logical deduction game that requires you to make a loop that goes through every square in the puzzle by following simple. This loop reveals a picture as you play.
- Knarly Jigs - Knarly Jigs is a cross between a jigsaw puzzle and a logic puzzle. The aim is the fit all the pieces into a grid.
- Honeycomb Hotel - Honeycomb Hotel is a game of deduction. The aim is to place each of the images in the correct spot in the honeycomb and to create a path that runs through each cell. Every game can be solved by using the clues provided. This game has also been used to teach logic to children in schools.
- Lunatile - Lunatile is a fun solitaire game using tiles. The aim of the game is to remove matching tiles until there are none left.
- Nonograms - Nonograms, also known as Japanese puzzles, pic-a-pix, picross puzzles, pikurosu or griddlers are are logic puzzles in which cells in a grid have to be coloured (or left blank) according to numbers given at the side of the grid to reveal a hidden picture. www.kaser.com have two version of this game: Descartes Enigma and Descartes Rainbow both of which are very good. There are other versions of this game available online, just do a search for nonograms on google.
Both websites have many other games that are great, and I recommend you try them all out before deciding which games to buy. If you do find these games useful, please buy the full versions as it helps the developers create new games for us all to enjoy and gives you more great features.