Grade Level: 2-8
Equipment: Foam balls, pins, pinnies
Game Description: In Pinball, there are 4 teams: throwers, rollers, retrievers, and goalies. Each team has it’s own role. Using the basketball court lines, place about 10 plastic pins in a line in the middle. The goalie team surround those pins and will try to protect them from getting knocked over. The throwers and rollers stand on the sidelines of the basketball court with dodgeballs, and continuously throw to try and earn points knocking over pins. The retrievers are along the ends, always getting the loose balls that were thrown, and giving them back to the throwers and rollers. Play for a few minutes each round, or until all the pins are knocked over! Keep track of points, or don’t – your choice! Make sure everyone gets a chance to play all roles. Lots of throwing, blocking, running, rolling, and fun in this physed game.
Category: Gr 7
Jump Jump Fit
Grade Level: 5-8
Equipment: Skipping ropes, lilly pads
Game Description: In Jump Jump Fit, players will get a good fitness cardio workout. Partners will find an area and set-up in the gym. 1 player will get the skipping rope. 1 player will place down 5 lilly pads on the floor to jump in a sequence. When groups are ready, the teacher or leader will set the timer for 1 minute and it’s go time! The player with the skipping rope will see how many skips he/she can complete in the minute. The other player will see how many reps of jumping on the lilly pads he/she can complete in the minute. After the minute, partners switch and go again. Try adding skipping tricks or 2-foot, left-foot, right-foot jumps and switch things up.
Longball
Grade Level: 4-8
Equipment: 2 mats, foam soccer balls
Game Description: Longball is another kickball type activity (or baseball activity if you want to use a big oversized plastic bat and a foam ball) that gets more players moving more often. With some important modifications to regular kickball, groups will get more sweaty and active, with lots of laughs and fun. Some strategy is for sure important, but in the end it’s about having a good time as a class or a group. (Thanks to Sabine Crandall for this idea).
Pin Galore Soccer
Grade Level: 1-8
Equipment: Plastic pins, foam soccer balls
Game Description: This is a great modification to the regular game of soccer that has proven to increase participation and motivation in the gym. Instead of the typical scoring into the other team’s goal, players will try to knock over the other team’s pins instead! If a player kicks the ball and it knocks down a pin from the other team, he gets to bring that pin (or pins if it’s more than 1) to his side and add them to his own team’s amount. The game goes until 1 team has all the pins or until the time runs out. Great lead-up soccer game for physical education.
Army & Navy
Grade Level: 2-8
Equipment: None
Game Description: This fitness or warm-up/running game is a calling game. The caller (usually the teacher) calls out these commands:
Army: Run to one side of the gym
Navy: Run to the other side of the gym
Hit the deck: Lie face down
At ease: Stand up
Try adding some rules such as “first one to Army gets a point” or “last one to Navy is out”. Players must be careful to wait for the “At Ease” command before getting up to run somewhere. Or add your own ideas to modify this quick physical education game to suit your needs. (Thanks to Justin for this game idea)
Mushroom Ball
Grade Level: 4-8
Equipment: 1 Foam Ball
Game Description: The game of Mushroom Ball starts with students scattered in the gym (or field) and a toss-in where any student is free to go after the ball. The player who gets the ball becomes the thrower and will try to throw at any player (discuss safe areas to throw at – maybe from the knee down). The thrower may not take more than three steps before throwing the ball. If a player gets hit he must sit down as a mushroom. Watch out for the mushrooms because they are allowed to tag while sitting! If a sitting player (mushroom) happens to get a hold of a loose ball, they must attempt to pass the ball to another mushroom until all of the mushrooms have touched the ball. If all the mushrooms have touched the ball without an interception by the standing players, the mushrooms get to stand up. A winner is declared if one player is left standing. Try it out for something new in your P.E. class. (Thanks to Eric Grohs for this game idea)
Hit & Run
Grade Level: 1-8
Equipment: Foam Balls
Game Description: Hit & Run is a physical education warm-up or dodgeball lead-up game. The idea is very easy, and it really gets the heart rate up: First thing, students partner up. One person starts with the ball. The other person has no ball, and gets a 5 second head start, then runs away. After the 5 second head start the thrower can go chase. They throw as many times as needed until they make a hit. When a hit is made they switch roles. Important to emphasize safety and where on the body it is okay to throw and not to throw the ball. Other than that have fun with another awesome PE game idea! (Thanks to Tate Braeckel for this game idea)
Sideline Soccer
Grade Level: 2-8
Equipment: Foam Balls
Game Description: In sideline soccer, teams become goalies along their respective sidelines, using their best goaltending skills. Imagine the set-up as big lines of goalies stretching across the entire length of the sidelines – for each team. Meanwhile the first 5 players from each team enter the playing area from the front of their line to play some soccer (choose 2-3 balls to use all at the same time). Whenever a goal is scored on a team, just put the ball back into play and keep going – no need to stop the play for anything! After 2 minutes blow the whistle and the 5 players from each team that were on the playing area will go to the back of their teams line of goalies and 5 new players who were at the front of the line enter in as players. Great game to play to work on all the soccer (football) skills. Also a great game for large groups.
Prison Ball
Grade Level: 4-8
Equipment: Foam Balls
Game Description: Prison ball is a dodgeball-type game where 2 teams face-off against each other. Along the ends of the gym, behind each team is a prison area. Whenever a player gets hit, he or she must head to prison behind the opposite team on that end. They are stuck there until they can throw a ball and successfully hit someone while they’re in prison — and then they can return home to their team, while the player they hit must then go to prison! Very interesting type of dodgeball game where players must be aware of their complete surroundings, front, back, sides. Balls flying from all over the place makes it challenging and lots of fun!
Tricky Dribbling
Grade Level: 3-8
Equipment: Basketballs (or soccerballs), plastic bowling pins
Game Description: Here is a quick game that helps players improve their dribbling skill (not just basketball, but could be done in soccer or hockey for example as well). Partners build their own ‘mini-course’ in whatever shape or line they’d like. Then they dribble through, inside, or around it, trying to NOT knock over the pins. Lots of different ways this basic idea could be turned into games of sorts, as can be seen in the video… all-in-all just another fun little way to spice up a routine skill and development.