Play with me

Title of the activity PARADISO o CAMPANA (IT); HOPSCOTCH;

SALIGAROS (GR); RAYUELA (ES)

School ISTITUTO COMPRENSIVO MONTE ROSELLO ALTO

Sassari, Sardinia, Italy.

Age group / Level Any age and several levels

Aim/s To know and master's body

To interact with other children

Instructions

The court (or course)

To play hopscotch, a course is first laid out on the ground.

Depending on the available surface, the course is either

scratched out in dirt, or drawn with chalk on pavement.

Designs vary, but the course is usually composed of a series

of linear squares interspersed with blocks of two lateral

squares. Traditionally the course ends with a "safe" or

"home" base in which the player may turn before

completing the reverse trip. The home base may be a

square, a rectangle, or a semicircle. The squares are then

numbered in the sequence in which they are to be hopped.

Playing the game

The first player tosses the marker (typically a stone, coin or

bean bag) into the first square. The marker must land

completely within the designated square and without

touching a line or bouncing out. The player then hops

through the course, skipping the square with the marker in

it. Single squares must be hopped on one foot. For the first

single square, either foot may be used. Side by side squares

are straddled, with the left foot landing in the left square,

and the right foot landing in the right square. Optional

squares marked "Safe", "Home", or "Rest" are neutral

squares, and may be hopped through in any manner without

penalty. After hopping into the "Safe", "Home", or "Rest"

the player must then turn around and return through the

course (square 9, then squares 8 & 7, next square 6 and so

forth) on one or two legs depending on the square until he

or she reaches the square with their marker. They then must

retrieve their marker and continue the course as stated

without touching a line or stepping into a square with

another player's marker.

Upon successfully completing the sequence, the player

continues the turn by tossing the marker into square number

two, and repeating the pattern.

If while hopping through the court in either direction the

player steps on a line, misses a square, or loses balance, the

turn ends. Players begin their turns where they last left off.

The first player to complete one course for every numbered

square on the court wins the game.

Although the marker is most often picked up during the

game, historically, in the boy's game, the marker was kicked

sequentially back through the course on the return trip and

then kicked out.

Timing There is no limit

Grouping and interaction There is no limit to how many can play (from one

to…………..)

Origin

There are apocryphal stories of hopscotch being invented by

Romans or Chinese, but the first recorded references to the

game in English date back to the late 17th century, usually

under the name 'scotch-hop' or 'scotch-hopper(s)'. A

manuscript Book of Games compiled between 1635 and

1672 by Francis Willughby refers to 'Scotch Hopper‥.

They play with a piece of tile or a little flat piece of lead,

upon a boarded floore, or anie area divided into oblong

figures like boards'. In Poor Robin’s Almanack for 1677, the

game is referred to as "Scotch-hoppers." The entry states,

"The time when schoolboys should play at Scotch-hoppers."

The 1707 edition of Poor Robin’s Almanack includes the

following phrase… "Lawyers and Physicians have little to

do this month, so they may (if they will) play at Scotch-

hoppers." In 1828 Webster's An American Dictionary of the

English language also referred to the game as 'Scotch-

hopper'...'a play in which boys hop over scotches and lines

in the ground.'Since the game was known and popular in the

seventeenth century, it is logical to suppose it may have

existed at least a few decades (or perhaps even many

centuries) before its earliest literary reference; but no

conclusive evidence has yet been presented to support this

theory.

Bibliography

Wikipedia