Schoolyard Games

[Miss Chicken]

Quite a while ago I was looking at a thread on IMDB about the New Zealand movie Once Were Warriors. A person wanted the meaning of a song from the movie explained. The song was What's the Time Mr Wolf. I explained that I thought the song was referring to a schoolyard game of that name. I played this game in the 1960s in Australia and, going by the song, it was also played in New Zealand. I explained how the game was played.

Some people from Britain said they also played the game, as did one man who grew up in Boston in the 1970s.

The game is played like this

One of the chidlren (Mr Wolf) stand with his face to a wall. The other children start to creep up on him asking "What's the time Mr Wolf". Mr Wolf turns around briely and says "One O'Clock" or "Four O'Clock" or "Nine O'Clock" etc and then turns back to the wall, The children then continue to edge their way closer asking the same question. Eventually, When he thinks they are close enough, Mr Wolf will shout "Dinnertime and I am going to eat you up". The children start to run and Mr Wolf tries to capture one and if he is successful that child becomes Mr Wolf.

So I would like to see how many people here used to play this game.

Also feel free to mention any schoolyard game that you did played so we can see how universally it was played.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

Mr. Wolf was one of the first school playground games I ever played. I had good memories of that one.

We also played a variation of Hide and Seek on our street where, instead of being merely found in our hiding place, once the counting had finished, we had to actually sneak away, out of our hiding places, away from the guy who was It™ and then reach his starting point, or the "dell", before he could spot us and run back to the dell and count us "out."
Great fun, that was. My friends and I always used to play that every summer.





Oh, and Miss Chicken?

[walks up to Miss Chicken, "tags" her]

You're It™!

[runs away, giggling]

 

[auntiehill]

^Uh...NOPE. Never heard of that one. We played "Freeze Tag" or "Red Light, Green Light." We also played "Kick the can," Dodge Ball (aka hit other kids with a ball as hard as you can), Red Rover (guaranteed that someone's wrist will get broken), Hide and Seek and its odd variation, Sardines. Instead of hiding and being found, one person hides and everyone seeks that person out. When you find him/her, you keep quiet and join said person in the hiding place. Hence, by the time the last person finds you, you are packed in like Sardines. This was a great game, as I grew up in an oddly shaped, multi-level house with LOTS of hiding places.

Granted, Sardines becomes a LOT more interesting when you're a teenager.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

We had Dodgeball too, mostly in gym class, in one of two variations. In one variation the guy who was It™ stood in the centre of the hall and would try to strike as many kids as possible with the ball. What was more fun was Team Dodgeball, which many will be familiar with. I was good at Dodgeball.

I wanted to play Sardines a lot, but it never really caught on among my peers.

 

[cultcross]

Definitely played Mr Wolf.
We also had a fad for a game we called 'fumball' which involved throwing a tennis ball against a wall. The upshot of the game was that if you dropped the ball ('fumbled' it), you had to stand against the wall and get the tennis ball thrown at you.
It was eventually banned in every school I attended

 

[Luckyflux]

We played all of those too. I particularly liked GaGa. Not to be confused with Lady Gaga, or Vlad Guerrero (Senior Gaga). This game is played like dodgeball but the balls are on the ground and rolled (or hit towards) your feet. If the ball hits you on the leg you are out.

I also liked Capture the Flag and Manhunt. Another fun one was Bombardment, which is just like Dodgeball, with slightly different rules.

 

[Mallory]

Team dodgeball, kickball and pretty much the rest of America's "ball" games (i.e. football, basketball, softball, etc.). And one particular game that they don't play anywhere any more. That involved a ten foot high ball placed at midfield with one class on each side. The objective was to push the ball across the opponent's goal line. Eventually, with 20 or more students on either side, the ball would end up lifted up off the ground and then all hell would break loose. Great way to spend 45 minutes.

 

[Miss Chicken]

Did anyone here play Elastics? I belive this game is/was known as Chinese Jump Rope in the USA.

Photos of the game being played

This game was extremely popular when I was growing up. It was almost alway only played by girls.

I used to practice the game at home by putting my elastics over and between two chairs.

 

[Deranged Nasat]

Oh, yes, I know "What's the Time, Mr. Wolf" I'm British, for what it's worth.

Of course, by age 9 we stopped that to make up far more imaginative games. The vampire game was the best, but that was so specific no other children could have been playing it....

 

[Gary Mitchell]

We used to play "Smear the Queer" when we weren't playing dodgeball or kickball. Everyone would run after and tackle the person with the ball (with us we usually used a football). I remember once trying to tackle this big kid by myself and getting kicked in the mouth with his heel. Ouch.

 

[The Boy Who Cried Worf]

We used to play "Smear the Queer" when we weren't playing dodgeball or kickball. Everyone would run after and tackle the person with the ball (with us we usually used a football). I remember once trying to tackle this big kid by myself and getting kicked in the mouth with his heel. Ouch.

We called it "kill the guy with the ball". Ironic because your whole purpose in the game was to try and get the ball for yourself.

 

[thestrangequark]

I've never played the Mr. Wolf game. I was very fond of hand clapping games, the more complex, the better. I can remember most of the rhymes, too: Miss Lucy had a steamboat, Miss Mary Mac, See See O Playmate, etc.

My favorite game at school was Pit Monster, a game I think was unique to my school because I don't know how many have a giant pit in the play yard. The pit was about 3 feet deep and just wide enough for a child to jump across with a good head start. One child would stand in the pit and be the Pit Monster, and everyone else (sometimes up to 30 or 40 of us would play at a time) would run and jump across the pit. If the Pit Monster tagged you, you'd have to join him as a Monster. The last child standing wins, and becomes the next Pit Monster.

I was also very fond of Sardines, which we played in the woods on trips, and Life and Death in the Forest as well.

 

[The Boy Who Cried Worf]

There were two playground games I remember. I don't know what the first one was called, but it took place in a large rectangle drawn on the ground which was then divided into three squares. You'd stand in one of the outer squares and your opponent would be in the other. Then you'd bounce the ball into the middle square as hard as you can towards your opponent and your opponent had to catch it or he was out. You could also fake out your opponent by doing "baby bouncies" or "skids" where you pretend your going to slam it but instead lightly drop of skid the ball. Kind of like a form of tennis I guess.

The other I remember was called four square, but I totally forgot how to play it.

For gym we use to play "hoccer" or "sockey" which looking back was basically field hockey with these large Nerf sticks. Capture the flag was a big one too.

 

[RJDiogenes]

Yeah, I think we played Four Square in Weymouth. I seem to remember a square divided into fours painted on the playground; I can't remember how to play either. Also in Weymouth, we played a kind of dodge ball called Bombardment.

In Dorchester, I remember playing Red Rover, Tag and Freeze Tag. We also played the game where you bounce a pimple ball off the wall in front of you and the kid behind you has to catch it; we called it Three Flies Out or Off The Wall.

 

[Gary Mitchell]

^ A pimple ball?

 

[Miss Chicken]

I used to like to play the ballgame Sevens which you either played alone or with one other child. You played it using a wall

You had to catch the ball on the full - 7 times
Catch the ball after throwing at the wall and allowing it to bounce on the ground once - 6 times
Thow it on the ground so that it bounced on the wall and then you caught it - 5 times
Under you leg and against the wall - 4 times

I can't remember what 3 and 2 were but for number ine you had to throw the ball, spin around and catch it.

 

[RJDiogenes]

^ A pimple ball?

Maybe they don't make them anymore, or they're called something else now. This was back in the 60s. They were kind of red with little bumps all over them like pimples, and they bounced pretty high.

 

[Gary Mitchell]

^ A pimple ball?

Maybe they don't make them anymore, or they're called something else now. This was back in the 60s. They were kind of red with little bumps all over them like pimples, and they bounced pretty high.

That sounds familiar. I had just never heard that name for them.

 

[RJDiogenes]

I guess it was probably one of our local terms, like spuckie and tonic.

 

[Kirkman1987]

I liked Kickball and bicycle races. I raced for miles almost every day as a kid. one time I was going steeply downhill on a gravel road and hit a rock. My bike flipped, and my fac e was dragged over several feet of gravel at high speed. I remember walking home bleeding a bit. My entire face from my left cheek up was swollen and purple for a week.