by Ruth Woodhouse

Created on: February 29, 2008

What a fun topic! I have been thinking a lot about it today and it's amazing what has come back to me after all these years. I started primary/elementary school in 1965 and there were so many games we used to play in the school yard back in those simpler times.

I have just asked my six-year-old son what games he plays at school. He said that they still play Tag - as we did. In the Australian island state of Tasmania, where I grew up though, I'm sure we called it Tiggy. It seems every Australian state has a different name for Tag.

I asked my boy does he play hopscotch. He said "Sometimes" rather vaguely. I'm sure I've seen permanent hopscotch markings on the pavement at his school though. We used to draw our own in chalk when I was at school. Hopscotch would surely have to be one of the most ancient children's games. No doubt many hopscotch markings have been drawn in the dirt with a child's finger.

My son also said they sometimes make up their own games. Well that's certainly good use of the imagination. Kids don't use their imaginations enough these days. I know my little fellow has often said that he likes playing dinosaurs at school. That's no surprise as he is obsessed with dinosaurs.

When I was at school one of my favourite games was enormously popular among the girls. It was simply called "Elastics". A long piece of thick elastic with its ends tied together was all that was needed to play. I expect most girls had their own piece of elastic they carried around - but only one was needed for a group to play. It was great exercise too. Two girls would stand a few feet apart with the elastic wrapped around their ankles. Then the rest of the girls in the group would take turns doing various acrobatic jumps and twirls with their feet landing on each side of the outstretched elastic.

Group skipping was also very popular when I was in the upper grades of primary/elementary school. Again there would be two girls to hold each end of the rope and turn it so that other girls could take it in turns skipping. It was terrific exercise and lots of fun. We had the traditional skipping rhymes that we would chant as a person was skipping. Sometimes a couple of girls would skip in unison. I can remember a few of the rhymes we used to recite in that typical sing-song fashion which kids have always used for such an activity. One of them was:

"Cinderella dressed in yeller
Went upstairs to kiss a feller.
On the way her panties busted.
How many people were disgusted?"

We would then go

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