It’s easy to wish we had the money to buy all the coolest games out there so we can look cool or make a fun experience for our students. Then we look at our budget and realize that we don’t have the money to do it. I saw a really cool game that cost about $500!!! It is a great game, but not everyone has that kind of money to spend. What if you figured out a way to have a great game with things you already have in your storage closet?!

The idea for this came when our former intern said to me, “You have a game ready to go for tonight, right?” Just moments before we were going to start. He had forgotten to ask me and realized that as soon as he saw me smile. I told him I would come up with something, but that it would likely cost him something. I knew I had about 15 minutes before it was time for our game, so I went to the storage closet and began to look around for what we had.

What I saw brought delight to me heart and a twinkle to my eye. There were some hula hoops, several different sports balls and clothespins. I had my game! I was pretty excited.

Game play:
3 leaders stand at varying distances with hula hoops in the air over their heads.
Student stand at the front of the room and has a football, a beach ball and a frisbee.

Points:
They get to throw each of the “balls” once.
2 points for the closest hula hoop
5 points for the second hula hoop
10 points for the furthest hula hoop

Winning:
The winner for this game is every student that plays. Remember I said he would have to “pay” for it? The points were traded in for clothes pins. Each point a student had, they got to place a clothes pin on my interns’ face.

The students loved it and my intern graciously smiled his way through the pain.
sports stuff

If you want to do the same game, minus the pain, give away 1,000s* of points and give a prize to the winner.

You can always spend money for great games, and that is good, but look around at what you already own. You might just find a gold nugget sitting around. Bring some of your creative types with you and ask them what games they see when they look in the youth area.

*I’m a huge fan of giving out lots of points instead of 1 or 2. They don’t cost you anything and it mentally feels cooler to get 10,000 points for something rather than 1 point. It truly builds more excitement for everyone involved.