My colleague Leah Ingram, who blogs about frugal living over at SuddenlyFrugal, has some great suggestions for ways parents and kids can get the best values when buying used video games or selling them. For example, do you know when is the best time to sell a video game? Or which games hold their values best? I sure didn’t. Head over to Leah’s post for all the details.

What’s will be on your kids’ holiday wish lists this year? This week Nintendo announced games scheduled for release this fall.

Highlights include Wii Fit™ Plus (Oct. 4) and New Super Mario Bros.™ Wii (holiday 2009). These games will join the current hot seller, Wii Sports Resort™, which comes with the precision-control Wii MotionPlus™ accessory. In the portable games category, Pokémon™ Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky (Oct. 12), Style Savvy™ (Nov. 2) and The Legend of Zelda™: Spirit Tracks (Dec. 7) in addition to the just-released Mario & Luigi™: Bowser’s Inside Story,…

I have never given much consideration to children’s screen names and safety (except when my tween requested IM privileges with “CandyMan” — who, luckily, turned out to be a female fifth-grade friend and not the predator I’d conjured). So, I was all ears when a local Internet expert offered three great guidelines for safe screen names for kids:
1. Never use a name that indicates whether the child is a boy or girl. Obviously, this includes the child’s actual name.
2. Never use numbers in a screen name…

OK, I’ll admit it: As a parent, I get tired of saying no. That’s why I gravitate to plans or programs to help kids limit the length of time they spend in the front of the TV or on the computer, rather than the endless nagging: ”You’ve already used your TV time. (And this time I mean it.)” Here are some tricks that kids often find more palatable than a more straightforward “two hours per day” mandate.

If you’re like me, the thought of buying a new piece of recreational hardware (even when it’s just sanctioning a purchase by your child) is often accompanied by the thought, “How long before this becomes obsolete?” This article from Fast Company answers that question for everything from the Wii to GameStop to Halo with the inside scoop on what will be new in 2009 (and beyond) for consoles, games and distribution.

photo credit: craigmdennis

This morning I added another item to my growing “technology happy list:” Now kids can give to a worthy cause by playing online games. I’m always looking for ways to help my kids see how important it is to look beyond themselves, and I love that this ties together kids’ passion for games with doing good. An excerpt from The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society newsletter explains how Pledgeplay came about:

Taylor Carol, of Dana Point, CA, was a typical 11-year-old boy, into sports and video games. But when he got hit by a pitch

…

Check out my post today on Decoder, the blog of The Partnership for a Drug-Free America. I’ll be guest blogging there for the next week or so.

http://decoder.drugfree.org/