Spark
Grades 3-5
Cones
Development Goal
To develop nonverbal communication, hand-eye coordination, creative thinking, body awareness, teamwork, decision-making capabilities
Before You Start
Skills Practiced: Reflexes, observation, body awareness, cooperation, memory, Ro Sham Bo
- Divide students into pairs.
- Have the students in each pair stand facing each other anywhere in the space.
- Place a cone on the floor/ground in between each pair of students.
- Remind students that this is a silent game.
Set Up
Designate an open area indoors or outdoors (a classroom works fine).
How to Play
- When the adult blows his/her whistle, each pair of students invents a patterned clap without talking and using only their hands.
- Give the pairs of students about a minute to find a rhythm and memorize/get used to their claps.
- The adult says “Spark” and the students stop clapping and try to touch their cones with one hand before their partners touch them (if both students touch the cone at the same time, they can Ro Sham Bo).
- The student who touches the cone first picks up the cone.
- The students who are holding cones walk around the space to find new partners who are not holding cones (the partners who are not holding cones can stay where they are).
- The cone is placed on the floor between the two new partners, and the adult blows his/her whistle and the new partners invent their own patterned clap.
- Game continues until each student has had at least a few different invent-a-clap partners.
Variations
Music can be used to inspire clap patterns; when the music starts, the students start clapping. When the music stops, students stop clapping and reach for their cones