Children and Poker
How old do you think a child should be before teaching the game of poker? My daughter 5 and I've been teaching her the game. Sometimes but not very often I've let her press the buttons while playing online games (she's pretty good too)
We also play just for fun with the chips, friends and family.
We also play just for fun with the chips, friends and family.
Comments
Actually, poker is pretty good for kids. A real life application of probability theory and money management. Plus it is damn good fun. Just don't let them onto your account after they have been drinking...
involved until they were of legal age. Think of it as
"contributing to the deliquency of a minor", cuz
that's what a judge would call it if you got caught.
(there is a message in there somewhere)
And why stop with poker. Might as well pour them a whisky
and fire them up a cigar.
OK, I'm climbing off my soapbox.......
I don't think this is any different than kids bingo, or other games where luck+skill are at work. It's less of a gamble than CandyLand, which is pure dice-rolling with no decisions ("craps for kids"). Heck, half the games at Chucky Cheese are slot machines for kids.
I think it's good to teach them how to play poker. They are learning math skills due to odds and adding chips. They are learning social skills reading how people are acting. They are learning logic skills calculating which cards to play. I think it's fairly healthy for them.
Introducing money is not healthy for them, in my opinion, because they're simply not ready for that. However, they also aren't ready to make other buying decisions, so this isn't a "poker specific" issue. I have already sat down and explained gambling (and addiction) to them, and they already understand (at various levels) the risks associated with playing for money. When they're mature enough, then they can start "donating to daddy".
My 1 cent (I blinded out the other)
LOL. My son has been playing "cards" now for 8 months. My wife (who's dad taught her to count cards as soon as she could count to 52) spends alot of time teaching him how to generalize and count the deck (and no, I feel that being able to count cards is cheating. I think that if you can, all the power to you, keep playin BlackJack).
I spend my time with him teaching him the basics of poker. We are trying to avoid teaching him the whole bluff thing until he has a good grasp on card games. He does very well with 5/7 stud, but the hold-em took him awhile to understand. He said "Only 2 cards, and you have to share the rest? Doesn't that make it harder to know that you have the best hand and harder to fold?" HHHHMMMMMM, out of the mouths of children.
My son will be 9 on Aug.15th, he just finished grade 3. My wife started him on math as soon as he could count to 10. Last year the school had him tested and he is at a grade 5 level of math/science and a grade 6 for reading. He has become quite a good card player, and I fully believe that the math is helping.
He has started to read Dave's book, but the thing I like the most about this whole thing is the talk he had with me last weekend. It went like this....
"Dad, are you going to the casino again?"
"Yup, how come Buddy?"
"You go every weekend, sometimes twice"
"Does that bother you? I do wait till your in bed before I go"
"You spend $100 every night you go, are we going to be broke? Do you gamble to much like Uncle Ernie does? Will Allison (stepmom) leave you like Anne left Ernie?"
I explain to him that I have over the last year been putting money aside in the bank for myself to play, about $50 a week, like we do for his college/university fund. And that this is my hobby, kinda like him spending $13/week on collecting Yu-Gi-Uh cards.
He says "So it's just a hobby? If you are good why don't you do it as a job, like the guy's on TV?"
"Well kiddo, I have a lot to learn about poker still, just like you do. And I am practicing everytime I go to the casino, and if I do get good enough, maybe one day it can be a part-time job."
After a few more minutes, I explain to him about responsible gambling and addiction/problems. We have already talked to him about drugs and addiction, because the school had a seminar and he came home with an onslaught of questions.
So I feel that if when he is a teenager, has a job, is saving money, but building a poker bank roll and is being responsible that there is not a problem. I feel the problem is, like drugs most parents don't want to have the "talk", so kids find out for themselves, and become abusers or addicts. And I hope that having these talks and showing him that Allison and I are responsible with our habits that he will learn a good lesson. And have a healthy hobby(s) in life no matter what they are.
LOL, haha. That's great, I agree with you about everything, even prewatching most movies. 5 kids, kudos to you man, I have 2, and sometimes want to bang my head on the curb outside.
Responsible life, whether it be gambling, drugs, cars...whatever. Starts with responsible parenting, you can't guarantee the outcome, but you can help it along instead of ignoring it.
Did anyone else read this as a board?
Yes, I misread it and thought he had the straight.
ScottyZ
Come over to my court, you'll have company!!!!
This is an interesting post, I have two kids as well, 5 and 6, and I sat with my 6 year old just last night to start teaching him how to play...he has been watching me play and is interested in it (because Daddy is)Â so he has been walking around pretending to play and asking me to play with him, so I thought why not...we sat down with a deck and started to play a few hands and I tried to explain the hand rankings and the flop, turn, river, etc. He too had trouble getting around the idea that he had two cards and then we 'shared' the rest but it was a lot of fun. I sat there tho and really wondered...is this right? Should I be teaching him this? I don't know the answer really...but from my point of view, it was quality time together, we both really enjoyed it, I think it teaches some useful skills, and it's better then staring at a T.V. or playing X-Box so no, I don't think it's wrong.
For the record, he cleaned me out, I called with Q-Q (and the board was 2-8-J-8-2) when he bet 50-hundred-thousand dollars and then showed me 6-8.
I think as long as you treat it as a learning, problem solving, ciritical thinking activity (as opposed to a gambling, money making, groupies giving you a massage at the table kinda thing) that this would be just as beneficial to a child as teaching them chess or any other strategic game. Are you condeming your kid to a life of debt? Probably not unless that is the actual image that you are portraying when you play, which I don't think it is. My fater taught me chess, backgammon and other games that require thought as well as luck and I think it really helped develop critical analysis and math skills that help me now in my career, where I often also work with incomplete information.
LMFAO