Walktober is just around the corner; Governor Hogan’s month-long celebration of Maryland’s official exercise — walking.

When I was a kid, my mom used to take me on walks through our neighborhood, to the library, the ice cream shop, or the public pool, and sometimes just around the block. As a parent, I wanted to recreate that experience for my own kids.

When they were little, it was easy to get them to go for walks with me, but as they’ve grown, the call of electronics is like a siren song to my pubescent boys. So I’ve tried to get a little creative in encouraging them to go for walks with me. Wanting something that involved their phones, I found Pokemon GO, a game app based on the popular television shows and movies.

The point of the game is to walk around and catch the Pokemon characters on your phone as you encounter them, battle opponents at virtual gyms, and collect items necessary for in-game play. The best part is that kids must walk around to play the game; some goals can only be accomplished by walking certain distances.

So while I’m cognizant of how much screen time my kids are getting, sharing these walks where we hunt down Pokemon and battle rivals together is quality time I wouldn’t trade for anything.

Pokemon GO, developed by Niantic, is downloadable on iPhone and Android. The app is free, although it does offer in-app purchases, not necessary for game play. To learn more about Pokemon Go, go to https://pokemongolive.com/en/. To learn more about how to participate in Walktober, go to https://extension.umd.edu/resource/walktober.