Inhibition Game for Kids: Lightning Categories

Today we are launching a new game called Lightning Categories, focused on improving inhibition, processing speed, and sustained attention in children.

What does this activity involve?

This activity involves tapping the words that belong to the indicated category as quickly as possible and avoiding tapping the ones that don’t.

Below is an example of the activity Lightning Categories:

What does this activity work on?

By doing this task, children train inhibition, processing speed, and sustained attention.

As the levels go up, the time available to decide gets shorter, so children have to think fast (processing speed), control the automatic impulse to tap every word (inhibition), and keep their attention at all times so they don’t miss any word (sustained attention).

It’s easy to see how this activity can be useful in children’s everyday lives. For example, when playing games with family or friends, children can put into practice processing speed to make quick decisions, inhibition to resist impulses, and sustained attention to stay focused on the game. That’s why it’s a highly recommended task for working with children who have difficulties with impulsivity and attention.

Play by levels

This inhibition game for children is divided into phases. The first phase is the easiest, and children progress until they reach the hardest one, the ninth.

The user moves up or down a level automatically according to their correct answers and mistakes. The professional can also choose the level manually.

Customizing the activity

Custom levels can also be created to fit the user’s specific needs.

Parameters

In this inhibition, processing speed, and sustained attention game, we can set some activity parameters such as:

• the time stimuli stay on screen (sec),
• the maximum number of errors,
• number of stimuli,
• the total duration (sec),
• the number of target stimuli,
• and the number of different items.

General settings

You can choose other general settings such as:

• the number of exercises,
• the time limit,
• an inactivity alert,
• a visible timer,
• and instructions.

Adult version

The game Lightning Categories is the children’s version of the adult game Categories Against Time, which also focuses on developing the same areas of intervention.

If you enjoyed this inhibition game for children, you may also be interested in these articles:

“This article has been translated. Link to the original article in Spanish:”
Juego de inhibición para niños: Categorías relámpago