The game starts by the teacher putting the balloons in play by tossing them up in the center of the room, when each side immediately begins to play for them. It has been found that with two balloons and four goals, and the interference offered by fixed seats and desks, it is unnecessary to limit the players to any given area. This, however, may be done should play become rough.
A score keeper scores one for each team making a goal with its balloon, but the game continues without interruption, the balloon being at once put in play again by the teacher.
A fifteen-minute game should be divided into at least three periods, the teacher signaling for a rest at the end of each five minutes.
This game is admirable for the parlor, and may also be played in the gymnasium or playground.
This game was originated by Mr. Max Liebgold of New York City, and received the prize offered by Mrs. Henry Siegel in the competition for schoolroom games conducted by the Girls' Branch of the Public Schools Athletic League of New York City in 1906. The game is here published by the kind permission of the author, and of the Girls' Branch, and of Messrs. A. G. Spalding & Brothers, who publish the handbook in which the game first appeared.
_Gas ball; basket ball; hand ball; bean bag._
This is a form of ball tag. In it each player chooses a home or corner, as in Puss in the Corner, or Home Tag. When played out of doors, trees may be used for this purpose; in a gymnasium, pillars or different pieces of apparatus; in the schoolroom, the corners of the room, the front and rear corner desks, the teacher's desk, the radiator, or any other objective points. The players who are so stationed beckon to each other to exchange places, and as they run from one place to another the one who is It tries to hit them with the ball. Any one so hit changes places with the one who is It.
As in all ball-tag games, either a ball or bean bag may be used. If played in the schoolroom, a light gas ball should be used; elsewhere, anything from a light-weight hand ball to a basket ball would be suitable. Hard balls should be avoided.
Where there are many playing, it is advisable to have two or three who take the part of thrower or Puss (It), in which case there will be two or three balls or bean bags in play at the same time, and the game is made more rapid.