Grandparents Week~Friday: Play!–Grandma’s Favorite Recess Game

 

Jacks – Grandma’s favorite Recess Game

My absolute favorite game to play at recess when I was in elementary school was JACKS and the above picture is my jacks, bag and ball from when I was a little girl! I lived in Tempe, Arizona and attended Hudson Elementary. During recess you would see groups of girls sitting under the covered sidewalk that surrounded our school. The best spots were in the shade, of course. The game of jacks was very competitive and it seemed that someone was always in a huff or crying. But, when you were on top you felt a victory inside and tried to hide your smile of triumph. If you got too excited the other girls would try to cheat to pass you up. Overall it was a fun way to spend recess. If you wanted to be a winner you needed to practice at home because it takes a quick hand and fast eyes. I would like to see my sons play jacks compared to their video games!

Equipment needed to play Jacks: 10 jacks and one bouncy ball. (Nothing compares to the metal jacks we played with in the 70’s – I don’t know how you could play with plastic jacks!

Basic rules for Jacks:

Watch out if you don’t follow the rules you lose your turn!

Dropping a jack(s) or the ball.

Grabbing the wrong amount of jacks.

Touching or moving other jacks.

Letting the ball hit another jack (or your body).

Catching the ball at the wrong time.

Catching the ball with both hands.

Not catching the ball at all.

Using the wrong hand to catch the ball or grab a jack(s).

For more in depth rules you can visit this link.

A fun part to Jacks are the different levels. You start out at onsies and move up to tensies. This means starting out grabbing one jack at a time as you bounce and catch the ball and jack with one hand. Then you move to twosies and on up to tensies. Then you get to move on to the creative levels or rounds. Like pigs over the fence, around the world, into the cave and on. Sometimes we made up new levels for fun and intensity or to just show off.

Here is a video that is really helpful in learning to play jacks:

This fun post was written by my mother, thanks Mommy 😉 We love you!

Tags: grandparents week, jacks, play!, recess games

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