GaMes

Bocce Physical activity links: Participating with the children, developing movement skills (throwing, eye-hand

coordination), developing social skills (turn taking, cooperation) Language/literacy links: Vocabulary (movement words: e.g. slide, toss, close, far, near); counting and

measuring; predicting Equipment: 1 small ball (jack), several bean bags or soft toys per child, an everyday object

for measuring Where: Indoors or outdoors Let’s make: Bean bags (optional)

Let’s play � Place small ball or “jack” a few metres away from starting point.

� Have the children take turns to underarm throw or slide their bean bags toward the “jack,” trying to get the bean bags as close to the “jack” as they can.

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Bocce Physical activity links: Participating with the children, developing movement skills (throwing, eye-hand

coordination), developing social skills (turn taking, cooperation) Language/literacy links: Vocabulary (movement words: e.g. slide, toss, close, far, near); counting and

measuring; predicting Equipment: 1 small ball (jack), several bean bags or soft toys per child, an everyday object

for measuring Where: Indoors or outdoors Let’s make: Bean bags (optional)

Let’s play � Place small ball or “jack” a few metres away from starting point.

� Have the children take turns to underarm throw or slide their bean bags toward the “jack,” trying to get the bean bags as close to the “jack” as they can.

22Healthy Beginnings 2-5 Games: Coordinating Our Bodies 5

Excerpt from the HOP Early Learning Practitioners Resource (Decoda Literacy Solutions)

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GaMes

Try this way � Have the children find an object such as block, toy car, or shoe to use as a measure.

Play the game, and then help the children measure how close each bean bag is to the “jack.”

� Before tossing the bean bags, guess the distance of the closest and the furthest bean bag from the jack. Measure to confirm.

� For a child with vision impairment, ask him or her to walk back from the “jack” to the starting point so that child knows how many steps away the “jack” is. Give clues to the accuracy of the throw (e.g. “one step too far”).

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PHYSICAL ACTIVITY & LITERACY

6 Games: Coordinating Our Bodies Physical Activity & Screen Time

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