Category Archives: Games & Activities

Train Your Brain

Posted on January 6, 2013 | Leave a comment
Print Friendly

A Brain Health Workbook

 

Lately, it seems…

  • You can’t remember other people’s names.
  • You can’t remember where you put things.
  • You have difficulty thinking of the right words to express yourself.

If this describes your experience with again, Dr. Ryuta Kawashima’s Train Your Brain: 60 Days to a Better Brain is perfect for you. Each day, simply fill out one worksheet of easy math exercises, and you will b eon your way to rejuvenating your brain. The combination of the weekly self-tests and personal logbook will allow you to track your progress as you continue your Brain Training. Just give it 60 day, and you will have a healther, better functioning brain!

“Dr. Ryuta Kawashima is a well-known neuologist with long-standing expertise in brain imaging who has been a leading force in studying brain function at Tohoku University in Sendai Japan. This book makes good use of the well accepted premise that regular mental activity performed in a disciplined way is beneficial to cognitive function.”

- John Mazziotta, MD, PHD. Chair, UCLA Department of Neurology

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Games & Activities

Peg Solitaire

Posted on January 6, 2013 | 1 Comment
Print Friendly

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Peg solitaire is a board game for one player involving movement of pegs on a board with holes. Some sets use marbles in a board with indentations. The game is known simply asSolitaire in the United Kingdom where the card games are called Patience. It is also referred to as Brainvita (especially in India).

According to a popular story, the game was invented by a French aristocrat in the 17th century, when incarcerated in the Bastille, explaining the game’s less common name Solo Noble. John D. Beasley (author of The Ins & Outs of Peg Solitaire) has extensively searched for evidence to support this, and has found it lacking. The first reference to this story appeared in 1810, more than a hundred years after the alleged event. He believes that the colorful tale is fiction, yet it persists. In other sources, the invention of the game is attributed to the Native Americans—there is also no evidence to support this.

The first evidence of the game can be traced back to the court of Louis XIV, and the specific date of 1697, with an engraving made that year by Claude Auguste Berey of Anne de Rohan-Chabot, Princess of Soubise, with the puzzle by her side. Several works of art from that time show peg solitaire boards, demonstrating that the game was highly fashionable.

The standard game fills the entire board with pegs except for the central hole. The objective is, making valid moves, to empty the entire board except for a solitary peg in the central hole.

→ 1 Comment

Posted in Games & Activities

Chess

Posted on January 6, 2013 | Leave a comment
Print Friendly
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Chess is a two-player strategy board gameplayed on a chessboard, a square checkered gameboard with 64 squares arranged in an eight-by-eight grid. It is one of the world’s most popular games, played by millions of people worldwide at home, in clubs, online, bycorrespondence, and in tournaments.

Each player begins the game with 16 pieces: one king, one queen, two rooks, two knights, two bishops, and eight pawns. Each of the six piece types moves differently. Pieces are used to attack and capture the opponent’s pieces, with the objective to ‘checkmate‘ the opponent’s king by placing it under an inescapable threat of capture. In addition to checkmate, the game can be won by the voluntary resignation of the opponent, which typically occurs when too much material is lost, or if checkmate appears unavoidable. A game may also result in a draw in several ways, where neither player wins. The course of the game is divided into three phases:opening, middlegame, and endgame.

The first official World Chess Champion,Wilhelm Steinitz, claimed his title in 1886; the current World Champion is Viswanathan Anand. In addition to the World Championship, there are the Women’s World Championship, the Junior World Championship, the World Senior Championship, the Correspondence Chess World Championship, the World Computer Chess Championship, and Blitz and Rapid World Championships. The Chess Olympiad is a popular competition among teams from different nations. Online chess has opened amateur and professional competition to a wide and varied group of players. Chess is a recognized sport of the International Olympic Committee and international chess competition is sanctioned by the World Chess Federation (FIDE), which adopted the now-standard Staunton chess set in 1924 for use in all official games. There are also many chess variants, with different rules, different pieces, and different boards.

Since the second half of the 20th century, computers have been programmed to play chesswith increasing success, to the point where home computers can play chess at a very high level. In the past two decades computer analysis has contributed significantly to chess theory, particularly in the endgame. The computer Deep Blue was the first machine to overcome a reigning World Chess Champion when it defeated Garry Kasparov in 1997.

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Games & Activities