Physical Education Activities The Elementary Students Love To Play

At the end of June I will be finished with 28 and 1/2 years of teaching Physical Education.  I started out in a very small school where I had Kindergarten thru 12th grade.  Three years later, I left that school and taught Elementary Physical Education for the next 23 and 1/2 years.  I have taught High School Girls Physical Education for the past three years.  As you may imagine I have games and activities coming out the wazoo.  My goal is to continue sharing these as old games, new games, made up games, modified games and adaptive activities as all of them serve a purpose in our schools and gymnasiums.

As most of my years of teaching involved the elementary students, I will  begin with some of those activities.  My students always seemed to have their favorite ones and going from year to year and from class to class, there were similarities in their choices.

Here are some favorites:

Fire,Wind and Water - A game where students must remember where to run and what to do when they get there.  It involves memory, speed and action.
Directions:  Name 3 different lines in the gym.  One is Fire, one is water and one is wind.  They should be possibly and end line, a sideline and a middle of the gym line.
When the teacher calls Wind, the students must run to the line called Wind.  All must get to the line and sit down on it.  Whichever student is the last one to get there and be sitting is out and must go to the dungeon (I use the middle circle or the other end line as the dungeon or a mat.  Many times a student will be on the line and someone will get there after them but it's the last person to be at the line and sitting so make sure the last one sitting is the one that is out.
Next call Water or Fire and they must all move to that line and sit.  Last one sitting goes to the Dungeon.  To make things more interesting, I add a word "Snake" on that word all the kids must lay down like a snake, last one down is out. My elementary students love this game.

Steal the Bacon - Older Elementary Children  - Two teams, one on each enline, each have a corresponding number with a student on the other team. 
I use a ball for this game sometimes and other times I use a plastic chicken.  Call out one or more numbers.  When number is called, the student must run to opposite teams line then back to the middle where the teacher has rolled or thrown the object, to try to steal the object(ball or chicken) before the other player does.  If team member from A team picks it up, he/she must try to safely get back to his/her own end line with out getting tagged by the other player who did not pick it up.  A point is scored for a team if the get it safely or for the other team if he/she tags him/her.

Jewel Theives
 You will need beanbags and yarn balls or similar items for this game.  Scatter several beanbags, yarnballs, sockballs, etc behind one endline.  Pick 3 or 4 students to be the Cops, others are the jewel thieves.  Cops where a pinnie and go to the middle, all jewel thieves start at other endline.  Put the bucket that the beanbags and balls were in at jewel thieves endline.
On the word go, Jewel thieves must try to go over to where the jewels are, pick up one and bring it back to the bucket without getting caught by a cop.  If caught they must freeze and drop the jewel if they had one. Get unfrozen by an uncaught jewel thief who must take them by the hand back to the endline area.  If jewel is dropped near them anyone who is not caught can take it to bucket.

Take only one jewel at a time
Game over when all jewels are in the bucket
Change to get new people to be the cops

These are just a few Physical Education activities that  Elementary students love to play.

The Importance Of Play For Children, Adolescence And Young Adults

There are always times when teachers are looking for activities to do with their students.  Specific physical education activities can be helpful for classroom teachers as well as for the physical education teachers.  Playtime during the course of a school day is important.  Sometimes with all the emphasis on testing, its easy to forget that kids still need playtime.  

So I have taken it upon myself to put some activities out there that are easy to implement for classroom teachers, aides, monitors, elementary PE teachers, Middle School PE teacher, HS PE teachers and just about anyone in the school who may need an activity to fill up a day or an event.  By coming to my blog you will be able to look and find activities that are quick set up or no set up, warm-up, low organization and short or full period activities.

I like pictures to illustrate some of the activities.  In some cases, I may even use video to show games, stations, or fun lessons.  

The importance of play for children, adolescence and young adults and even for grown adults is so important and sometimes overlooked.  And with the age of cell phones, Ipads, computers and video games, physical activity and play is becoming less and less important to children too.  They are growing up in a time where they may think that they are playing but it's on a screen.  They aren't actually doing the playing.  I've been to several workshops as an adult where we are required to sit and listen and it is not easy.  Even adults want to get up and move and when put into activities where they are moving and  mingling, smiles return to their faces.  It's the same for all age groups.

The physical activities I will write about in my blog posts will vary between simple activities to harder and more complex.  The posts will be directed toward a variety of age groups but many can be modified to be used with almost any age group.  Believe it or not, High School students and adults still like to play elementary aged games.  Why, because they are fun.

Here's an activity that can be done starting in about 4th grade and is enjoyed by people of any age.  The only skill needed is to be able to throw and an catch a ball.

Participants stand in a circle, seven people per circle.  Start with one ball in the hands of one person but have two or three more balls ready.  The first person throws the ball to a person across from them but must be the third person away from them so in other words they don' throw it to the person beside them or the next person in the circle, its the third person away from them. Then that person throws it to a person across and the third person away from them.  Continue until everyone has thrown to a person across from them.  You now have a pattern and continue throwing and receiving in this pattern.  When the throwing pattern is accomplished, another ball is added, always throwing and receiving from the same person but now there are two balls going.  When that is mastered add a third ball and see how many balls your team can get going.

It is a simple activity, but one that requires a a little bit of physical ability and a little bit of thinking and remembering.  It's fun for almost all ages.