What can dominos do for your brain? Keep you fit, keep you mentally alert and keep you socially engaged.
Mario Llorente has played dominos for over forty years and has met hundreds of players in their 80s and 90s. The game is really a brain-challenging series of activities to keep players considering the myriad ways that the 28 tiles can be played.
Llorente has organized a course to explain the "team dominos" set of rules that promote collaboration, one of the skills that employers seek in new hires, according to Harvard professor Tony Wagner. "Bill Gates and Warren Buffett advocate bridge as a way to encourage peple to work together. Dominos is the same sort of activity."
The game is played throughout the Caribbean, Europe and South America in the partner format.
"Of course, the essence of the game is more than a game. It is a
social activity that stimulates the brain," added Llorente. "There are
people in their nineties who play in the Caribbean. The effort of
making it to the domino park keeps these people going and engaged in
society."
Objectives of the course include
(a) Learning the rules and history of the game
(b) Learning the differences between individual (everyone for himself) dominos and the team version of the game
(c) How to organize the hand and how to play a tile with or without a pause (to communicate to the partner about what else might be in the hand).
(d) Anticipating the end game. This is called "How to read the board." If you hold 6/5 tile and there are four other tiles with six on the board, then you know that two tiles are still to be played. The technique of anticipating how those other two tiles will be played is part of the skill in the game. If you see that the 6/4 and 6/3 are not on the board, then you might arrange for a 3 or 4 tile to be played so that those numbers are displayed, ready to give a place for the 6/4 or 6/3 to be played (giving you the safe place to put your 6/5 tile).
(e) Enumeration of the benefits of the "brain activity." The American Assocaition of Retired Persons (AARP) has a program called Brain Fit which includes five compoents including propter nutrition and adequeate sleep. Team Dominos covers three additional components: Building social networks, getting exercise (get out there to make it to the daily tournament) and stimulating the mind.
EXPECTED OUTCOMES
(a) Participants will be able to join domino tournaments
(b) Participants will understand the rules of the game
(c) Participants will have an additional mental activity to use to keep the brain stimulated.
BONUS: The course will include a free ebook "DOMINOS FOR SCHOOLS" so that participants can introduce the skill of dominos to students and teachers. As a volunteer in schools, participants can bring the agility of probability into the classroom in a practical way.
http://www.lulu.com/us/en/shop/steve-mccrea/dominos-for-schools/paperback/product-20032681.html
Materials for the course
Tips About Dominos (an ebook). The ebook can be downloaded at
http://www.scribd.com/doc/124903727/Tips-About-Dominoes-ABCDominos-com
Stay Sharp With Dominos by Mario Llorente and Steve McCrea
http://www.amazon.com/Stay-Sharp-Dominos-Steve-McCrea/dp/147925911X
Additional References to studies about how daily activities can affect mental agility
How do people's lifestyles and daily routines affect their minds? by Lisa Davis, AARP
http://www.aarp.org/health/brain-health/info-06-2013/memory-is-mine-normal.html
12 Ways to Keep Your Brain Young
http://www.health.harvard.edu/fhg/updates/update0606a.shtml
An active brain slows dementia
http://blog.aarp.org/2013/07/09/more-proof-that-an-active-brain-slows-dementia/