What games did you play as a child in your street, or the local playground?

Question

I looking to build a detailed study of games children play in the late 00's, and just wondered what adults played when they were children.

Could you also give an age (when you were playing the games) and a location, it needs to be a sbit more detailed than the UK, I would say Scunthorpe, UK.

Thanks

Answer 1

Best and most enduring of games I saw was a game called Kingy.
Played in a grid of 4 squares
A player in each square from King , 1, 2, Nut in a 4 square within a square shape
Hit tennis ball with hand into your own square to bounce over into another square.
Straight over is a foul and you drop down to position nut
Dittio if you dont bounce it in another square and goes out of the back
Hitting on volley is allowed.
On line is in
Games were perpetual
Aim is to become King and stay there as long as possible
Game can expand to more squares but 4 is standard
Played by kids from 8 to 15
Popular in Slough Berkshire in 1980s and probably into 1990s
Started in Marish middle school Langley Berks as far as I know but unsure when

Answer 2

Several issues need to be addressed here. First in our state an offender has to live more than 1000 feet from a school, park, church etc so call your local police and ask when it comes to this topic they are more than helpful. Second you can not change anyone else's opinion of him so don't waste your breath trying. Pedophiles are also con artist and know how to manipulate people which is why many victims do not tell. Now I have a beautiful 12 year old daughter who was molested by someone we THOUGHT was a friend. His wife and daughter knew he had been convicted of molesting his niece back in the early 80's but believed him when he said it never happened it was all because he was divorcing his wife and she had h child lie so she would get what she wanted in the divorce. He convinced them it was a lie and the rest of the family so since anyone who offended before 1997 did not have to register they all kept his secret and knowingly had him around their children and their children's friends. Now he is sitting in a jail cell awaiting trial on 63 counts of statutory rape and other things after he molested both of his grand daughters and three of their friends one of which was my daughter. We had him in our home, my husband gave him a job and all the perverted comments toward women were ignored because "that's how he is". Pedophiles DO NOT change, that urge is always there and statistics show that more than 90% re offend. Gather all the statistics then sit your husband down and make him read them, let him know about the cases like mine where every one believed he was innocent and then ask him if that is a chance he really wants to take with his daughter, then ask him which is more important his new friend or his wife and child. Make it clear in no certain terms he is not to be in your home or around your daughter, besides part of their release is they are to have no contact with minors so he already violated coming into your home REPORT it. Don't make the mistake I did I will never forgive myself for letting my daughter be hurt this way and nothing can ever give her back the innocense she lost.

Answer 3

Well at Infant and junior school (attended in west yorkshire from 1975 - 1982) we played off ground tig ( a tagging game where you were only safe if you stood on something like a bench or wall, and you had to come onto the ground to move around at some point. If you were tagged then you were now IT and had to get someone else)
Also Kiss catch where if you were caught by the person who was IT they had to kiss you and then you were IT.
At Grammar school (west yorkshire 1982 - 1989) we tended to play Rounders, Tennis, and just stand about chatting really.

Answer 4

Hi Bigtom. I'm from Barnsley in South Yorkshire age 37. These are the games friends and I would play around 7 to 10 years;

Kick the can.
Port and Starboard.
What time is it Mr Wolf?
Off ground tigs.
Truth, dare, kiss, honour or command.
Skipping.
Elastic.

Answer 5

I am from a modest working class African American Neighborhood and I was a child in the late 1970's-early 1980's. I lived in Atlanta Georgia and I played these games when was 5-11.

A lot of our games were musical and often mimicked life as we knew it.

We jumped rope to many songs, and did 'cheers', where we'd sing songs that was a derivation from popular songs (Motown hits--of course) but with different lyrics. We played many hand games, that involved groups of 2 or 4 and some of the coolest choreography to music "Miss Mary Mack" or "Rockin' Robin" or other songs.

Just as rap was becoming popular--we'd have rap battles or pick a topic and try to improvise and rap about it. We'd tell many 'yo-momma' jokes. That was fun! MTV does a cheesy version of that now.

We also like doing what we called 'flips'--where we'd take turns doing stunts that involved gynnastic like moves. It was like a follow the leader game. The moves became increasingly difficult.

We were very competitive--and did races of all sorts--mostly like obstacle courses we'd make-up.

We also played 'momma' instead of house (where we'd beat our bad kids and talk about 'our man'--now that was ghetto fun!) Some of my favorites were playing 'church' and 'school'--because yours truely was the teacher, most of the time. We had some cool 'sermons' at church and be 'filled with the spirit'--just as we saw the ladies of our church.

I was a whiz at 'jacks' we called 'jack-stones'; pick-up sticks and card games; my favorite card games were 'Spoons' and 'I declare war'.

I spent hours in the woods near my home building a secret club house with my friends with junk we'd find dumped around our homes. I use to also like to build bicycle ramps and do stunts with the fellas.

Don't let the media poison your view of working class black people in the US. I had a great child hood and still remember the games I played as a child fondly.

Answer 6

3-5 years old. Lyneham Wiltshire. England
There was an old hollowed fallen tree in the local park, that i used to have tea parties in with friends, we used to take blankets old sheets etc & cover the end of the tree & put up sticks to make the tree longer. We took down dolls plates etc in the dolls pushchair & food & drink was water from local stream & pretend food we used, mud, leaves, local wildlife, dead or alive etc!!
We also had a rope swing over the stream & a large gang of us used to play british bull dog this was children aged 3- about 15, games have different names in different places, but basically its the one where you have 2 teams, you hold hands, call over a named person who has to break the link in the team if they do they go back to their team with a person from the other team. If they don't break through you get to keep them, the team wins that has most people on it.

Answer 7

Red Rover, bull dogs charge, rounders, giant steps, queenio, what time is it mr wolf?, hopscotch, kicky like hopscotch but you had to kick a filled shoe polish tin over the squares if it landed on a line you were out. elastics (jumping game over a rectangle of elastic bands areound 2 kids ankles you jumped while the others sang England Ireland Scotland Wales inside outside on the rails and landed onor off the elastic), marbles on the shores on the paths, t.v. games (caller gives clues as to a tv programme and kids run up back then up to caller and guess tv show and if right they are the new caller, chasing, kick the can (kind of like hide and seek if someone sneaks up to the can without the caller seeing them they shout "kicked the can" everybody free! Snatch the bacon 2 teams on either side a stick is placed in the middle 2 players try to grab the stick and make it back to their team without getting caught if caught they are kidnapped & join the other team. We also played games where we replayed tv dramas and took parts and acted out the drama, relievieio: chasing when you were caught you were glued to the ground but if another kid ran through your legs you were free this was also called "stuck in the mud". These games were played when I was between 6 and 12 yrs old and in Dublin, Ireland. So many it's hard to remeber them all. We also set up obstacle coarses and pretended we were horses or jokeys and did show jumping, we also played tennis when wimbledon was on, hide and seek in other peoples gardens was very popular, playing house and putting on shows in your own back garden was a big thing too. YoYos were really popular at one point and a group of american pros came to our street to demonstrate it was sponsered by coca cola and we all had these yoyos! We also used to go to a nearby field and collect ladybirds and tadpoles or go down to the river and pick bull rushes. Hope this helps your research.

Answer 8

stockport, UK. Mostly tickstone - a version of hide and seek where you have to try and get back to the base without the hunter seeing you. this game is called different things all over the UK. We would also use the roundabout at the park to play pick up stix. You would all sit on the bottom runner of the roundabout (ours was a big wood one, with five sides and with wooden runners), one person would drop a lolipop stick and shout 'dropped it', the rest of you would then try to be the first to pick it up and shout 'got it'. resulted in much skin lost from tips of fingers. This would have been mid 80's.

Answer 9

Blackburn 1970s/80s: Bulldogs across: played on a field one boy in the middle, a gang of boys on the outside edge. Gang ran across field, boy in middle tries to stop as many as he can, those he catches also stand in the middle and the process is repeated until one person is left, that person being the winner. Could get quite rough, I personally suffered a fractured cheek bone.

Answer 10

freeze tag (age 6-12),flag footbal and tag football(age7-14),and of course kickball(age 7-15) all games could be played on the street or a vacant field in Lancaster ohio