Category: Football

Endzone Escape

Grade level: 4-8
Equipment: Cones, footballs, flags
Game Description: Try a few rounds of Endzone Escape to work on many football skills such as passing, punting, catching, and moving to specific spaces. Another fun game idea that passes the test of awesome games only (thanks Grant Johnson)!

Flag Tag 2

Grade level: 4-8
Equipment: Flags, cones
Game Description: This is another action-filled flag tag game to try out in P.E. class (thanks to Lauren Venera, who has already submitted some great game ideas)! Start by making 4 coned areas in each corner of the gym. Then create 2 teams (usually yellow and red) since that’s what most of the flags for flag football are. Once you have your two teams, split them again and they go in corners diagonal to each other. On the go signal or whistle, players will enter the playing area and try to pull the flag of the opposite team. If a player gets their flag pulled off, they are “out”. However, out means they go to the starting area out of the main playing area and perform exercises. Best idea is to have a white board with a list of exercises up and players work their way through the list. Play continues until there is no one of a certain color left. Once the round is over, put up some new exercises, get players to the corners, and start again!

Endzone Trappers

Grade level: 2-8
Equipment: Beanbags, Nerf Footballs, Poly spots
Game Description: This game can be a football lead-up game, or a stand-alone fun activity (can use different throwing skill besides football if you’d like to switch it up). Basically, 2 teams will face-off in an exciting sliding and throwing match, trying to put eachother into their jail (endzone) and escape from a jail by catching a ball thrown to them.
1. Split class into 2 teams – use pinnies to distinguish teams
2. Split court in half
3. Start game with bean bags and nerf footballs in the middle of the court and players on their respective walls
4. The goal is to try to get players from the other team in jail by sliding the bean bag on the floor to hit his/her foot (above the ankle does not count)
5. When hit in the foot with a bean bag, that player goes in the opposing team’s jail
6. To get out of jail, one of your teammates must throw the nerf football and it must be caught in the air in the end zone – when caught the player can return to their team’s side
7. Teams can have some defenders trying to intercept balls before the jailed players catch to keep them in jail
8. If players are in jail for awhile, call for a jailbreak

Key Points
-agility, throwing, sliding, catching, football vocabulary: Quarterback (throwers), receivers (catchers), defense (interceptions), complete vs. incomplete passes
(Thanks Brittany Dougher for this game idea)

Mat Football

Grade level: 2-6
Equipment: Exercise mats, footballs (suitable for indoors)
Game Description: Mat Football is a very simple and fun idea to work on throwing the football: teams will try to throw as many footballs as they can into the opponents target area (exercise mats set up on their ends). Split the gym into two halves, one team on each half. Set-up the mat target areas. Throw in a bunch of footballs. Make a throwing line where players can’t cross. Play 4 quarters (each 2-3 mins). Count footballs in each mat area after every quarter to add points. Move throwing line after each quarter to increase or decrease difficulty. Play with or without blocking. Have fun and practice skills as usual! Could be played with foam balls or indoor frisbees for a different challenge.
(Thanks to Dan Kirsch for this game idea)

Steal The Ball

Grade level: 2-8
Equipment: Type of Ball (Soccer, volleyball, basketball, etc. The more the better), hula-hoops
Game Description: Start by placing a whole bunch of balls in the center area, equally spaced between anywhere from 4-8 teams. At each team area, place a hula hoop for the balls to be placed after they are taken from the middle area. On the go signal, players from each team go one at a time to the middle, dribble the ball back to their hoop and tags the next person to go. The object is to take as many balls until all are gone from the middle. When all the balls are gone from the middle, then take one ball from any of the other teams. After a designated time limit count to see which team has the most!
For soccer, the balls are to be dribbled along the ground.
For volleyball, the balls are to be “set” or “volleyed” to self all the way back to the hoop.
For basketball, dribbling.
For football/baseball, the balls can be thrown from the middle back to partner at hoop.
AS ALWAYS, HAVE FUN (WHILE PRACTICING SKILLS)!

Perfect Pass

Grade level: K-8
Equipment: Hula Hoops, cones, type of ball (football, baseball, frisbee, etc)
Game Description: Perfect Pass is a great throwing and catching game that has players teamed up and ready to work together to earn points. Start by placing down a bunch of hula hoops along the floor, the more the better. Then make some teams of anywhere from 3-5 players who start lined up behind cones in a relay-style setup. Give each team a type of ball (depending which type of sport or throw you’d like to practice). When the game starts, the first person from each team runs to a hoop on the floor and stands in it, waiting to receive a pass from the second person in their teams line. A catch made with both feet in the hula hoop is a great thing, because then that player can bring the hula hoop home and add it as a point to their teams total (if the catch is NOT made, then the hoop does NOT return home = 0 points earned). Then the next person goes out to a hoop to catch another throw, etc, etc. The game continues on like that. Teams try to get the most points by collecting the most hoops, or try to beat their own best score each round. Try varying it up in a bunch of different ways (for example, different hoops are worth different points). And of course as usual, HAVE FUN!

(Thanks to Jason Rosenberg for this game idea)

Capture The Flag Relay

Grade level: K-6
Equipment: Cones, Hula hoops, Flags, Foam Balls (K-2) or Footballs (3-6)
Game Description: In this throwing, catching, and moving game, teams will start in a relay team format lined up behind their cone. On the far end of the playing area is all the flags (beanbags work well too) that teams will try to collect. In front of each teams cone is 3 hula hoops at different distances: near, middle, far. For every team, 1 player starts in the near hula hoop. That player will try to catch the ball thrown by the first player from their relay line. If caught, the catcher runs and collects a flag and returns it to her teams cone for 1 point. The thrower then proceeds to stand in the hula hoop to become the catcher, and then next person in line is now the thrower. Whenever a catch is NOT successful, the thrower retrieves the ball for the next person in line to throw and the catcher must STAY in the hula hoop until a catch is made. 5 catches from the first hula hoop level must be made before moving onto the middle level. 5 catches again must be made at the middle level hula hoop before moving to the far level hula hoop. Once 5 catches are completed there (and 5 more flags retrieved for a total of 15 flags) the round is over, and the team with 15 flags wins! As always, play again and again for lots of skill development, movement, and fun!
(Thanks to Mike Fraioli for this idea)