To beat the computer game Heave Ho, players must move between platforms on the screen by swinging their bodies back and forth to launch themselves through the air toward the next platform.

There’s a problem though: You’re just a little two-armed creature, and no matter how many times you swing and launch yourself toward the platform, you never come close enough to grab it.

Unless, of course, you team up with the other two-armed creatures.

“Give me your hand!” shouts one of the kids who lives at Solid Ground’s Sand Point Housing to a teammate on a recent Wednesday night. Hands linked, they swing back and forth before launching themselves at the platform and … fall just short of grabbing it.  

Everybody groans. “We were so close!”

It’s a surprisingly addictive game and has all the kids in the computer room at Sand Point Housing shouting out instructions and cheers as they work together to beat each level. It’s also an opportunity to reinforce a lesson the kids just learned about interpersonal and relational effectiveness, key aspects of a therapeutic approach known as Dialectical Behavior Therapy. 

“The goal is to teach really relevant skills to young people about how to manage their feelings, express their feelings, and cooperate with others, so the video games are just a way to practice that.” 

~Mei-Ling Morrison-Beals

“It’s more than kids just getting to play video games,” says Mei-Ling Morrison-Beals, Director of Behavioral Health at Atlantic Street Center. “I think a lot of times, when parents hear about this group, they’re like, ‘What do you mean my kids are going to spend 90 minutes playing video games?’ But the goal is to teach really relevant skills to young people about how to manage their feelings, express their feelings, and cooperate with others – so the video games are just a way to practice that.”    

The Wednesday night gaming sessions are part of Atlantic Street’s CoRe Gaming Group, which stands for Courage, Cooperation, Respect, Resourcefulness. Every week, instructors from Atlantic Street come to Sand Point with a crate full of laptops to help a group of middle school students build on their interpersonal skills, distress tolerance, and emotional regulation. 

Solid Ground partnered with Atlantic Street Center to bring the CoRe program to Sand Point as part of our dual commitments to increase access to behavioral health resources for those we serve and invest in the wellbeing and development of our community’s youth. Our Sand Point Housing is home to more than 175 children, all from families that have experienced homelessness and other traumatic challenges. 

Fortunately, studies* show that participating in positive youth development programs starting at a young age may result in reduced chances of experiencing poverty in adulthood. At Sand Point Housing, all children have access to tutoring, mentorship, afterschool activities, and special events throughout the year – in addition to programs like CoRe. 

“It’s all about engaging with kids and creating opportunities for them to seek out their own goals – and eventually break those cycles of poverty,” says Scott Moorhouse, the Family & Children’s Program Manager at Sand Point. 

The CoRe program is also just one of the behavioral health services we’ve brought to Sand Point after hearing from community members in our 2022 Community Needs Assessment that these kinds of support remain out of reach for too many. With financial support from Virginia Mason Franciscan Health, we’ve partnered with several organizations like Atlantic Street to bring a variety of behavioral health services to Sand Point so residents can get the support that works for them without leaving home.

At CoRe, each weekly session begins with a lesson about a particular skill, such as cooperation or communication. The kids then get to play a video game that allows them to practice the skill. The games are usually collaborative, requiring the kids to work together to be successful.  

For example, one session starts with a lesson about good communication, followed by a game in which the kids play as a team of cartoon chefs in a restaurant kitchen who must work together to complete orders as they come in from customers.   

“You’re working together as a team, so you have to communicate roles and what needs to happen next,” Mei-Ling says. “It has a tendency to become really chaotic, so it reinforces skills of working together for a common purpose.”

Other games are designed to be especially frustrating so kids can practice managing their emotional response to distress without being overwhelmed. Mei-Ling says the program is targeted at middle school students, because they tend to be more open to changing behaviors.   

“Middle school is kinda the sweet spot,” she says. “We find that they’re the most receptive to this kind of group learning.” The video games are a particularly effective tool for therapy, because the kids are excited to engage in them and are far less resistant than they might be to more overt approaches.  

Atlantic Street Center has been running the CoRE program for about eight years and sees how it can change behaviors in kids. Mei-Ling says parents report fewer power struggles with their kids, and schools report that kids who’ve gone through the program have an easier time making friends.   

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• *Long-term effects of a community-based positive youth development program for Black youth: health, education, and financial well-being in adulthood, BMC Public Health, 3/26/22 

• Check out our blog post How we’re using fun and play to make lifelong investments in our youth to learn about youth development activities at our Broadview Shelter and Transitional Housing. 

• All photos by Rachael Green.