Language and Culture BL question..

[pixiewife]

Any one have any ideas on games to play that originated in another country, to fulfill the requirement for the Language and Culture Beltloop?

I am looking for something that the boys can play in the cold (prefer indoors) next week in February. What I mean is, we all know soccer is from outside the U.S., and all of my Tigers have played soccer, but I want to acctually have them play it now, rather than talk about "remember when we played soccer, that game is from....." you know what I mean.

I appreciate any ideas...

Thanks!

~Pixie

[Lisabob]

Here are two games we used. I suppose they have some variants that exist in many cultures but these are games many Danish children play and they are very easy.

 

Game #1: Cat in the Corner

One boy is the "cat" and stands in the middle of the room. The rest of the boys are "mice" and start out in the corners of the room. On your signal, the "mice" must scurry to another corner. The cat tries to catch one of them before he makes it to the new corner. The one who is caught becomes the new cat and the original cat takes his place as a mouse in the corner. If it is too easy for the "mice" you can add another cat or two.

 

Game 2: Fire, Ice, and Water

You need three adults (or older children) to stand in different parts of the room. Each represents fire, ice, or water. In their parts of the room, people must do certain things - for example, in "fire" everybody is hot and has to make a fire-related noise (in Danish you'd say puha! - sounds like pooha - which translates loosely as "whew!" while wiping your brow or fanning yourself), in "water" everybody makes swimming motions while saying "bubble bubble" (boble boble in Danish) and in "ice" everybody shivers and says polar bear - iisbjorn! sounds like ees byorn! in Danish.

 

The kids stand in the middle of the room and the leader yells out FIRE (for example). The kids all run to the "fire" part of the room and start making the correct motion/sound. The last kid to get there and make the right motions becomes the game leader and picks the next thing to yell out.

 

I used both of these with a group of mainly tigers and wolves when I did a beltloop workshop for this beltloop. It worked pretty well and they had a lot of fun with it; just watch that you have sufficient space to avoid collisions.

[ScoutNut]

Try this web site -

 

http://library.thinkquest.org/J0110166/

 

 

[Eamonn]

The UK ScoutBase has lots of games of every sort for all age groups.

http://www.scoutbase.org.uk/direct/games/

 

Have fun

Eamonn.

[Trailblazermom]

pixiewife, I don't know if you have the Program Helps book for this year (you can also view it online) but for February in the Bear Den game/activities there are several games they have from China. One is the "chinese wall" another is "lame Chicken" Also they list jumping rope or "jumping 100 threads" as a game created in China 1500 years ago. The book gives all the details for each game.

trailblazermom

[SSScout]

The NAME "soccer" is a adaptation of "association football" (English). The game itself developed from various Roman/Aztec/Mayan/Germania (depending where you start)armies kicking their enemies loose heads around...

 

London Bridge... English

Crack the Whip...German/Swiss

Cat's Cradle... goes waaaay back

 

Google 'em.