Beta-Testing has begun for our pilot curriculum on e-sports! Thirty-five youth ages 12-18 joined our first Virtual e-Sports Club meeting. The initial curriculum focuses on teamwork, communication, strategy, visual/spatial skills, and sportsmanship.

A few guiding points/background for this pilot curriculum:

1) Esports is a form of sports primarily facilitated through electronic systems in which theinteractions between players and teams are enabled through human-computercommunication. eSports includes many video game genres as well as card games.

2 ) Studies have shown that esports provides many of the same benefits of other sports, minus the physical exertion. Those benefits include teamwork, communication, strategy, visual-spatial skills, and sportsmanship. (Granic, Lobel & Engels, 2014)

3) University of Illinois Extension 4-H will follow the ESRB rating system when selecting video to play with 4-H convened and hosted activities.

4) 4-H volunteers and staff leading e-sports clubs and events are required to follow ESRB ratings in selecting video games that match the ages of the participating 4-H members. Under no circumstances will video games with a Mature (M) rating be allowed during 4-H clubmeetings or other 4-H hosted events.

5) In making decisions about what games their kids can play at home, parents may find value in the following resources: Tips on parental controls and family discussion guide Game Reviews with details on presence of drinking, drugs and smoking, violence, sex, language, positive messages, positive role models and representations, consumerism and ease of play.

eSport competitions can be a career and/or a pathway to college. See what the UniversityofIllinois at Urbana-Champaign Esports team is up to at: https://esports.illinois.edu/

We’re excited to report back with more information as this curriculum evolves! For more information, contact Keith Jacobs at kjaco4@illinois.edu or Eric Li at el2@illinois.edu