When I was a kid, just the word evoked excitement – there were so many fun things to do. If the weather was nice, you got to go outside! A break from school! There were rings to ring, rungs to run, slides to slide down and all sorts of bars to clamor over. There were balls to throw and kick, girls to chase with hair to pull, and painted lines to hop over, serve into and get played out of. There was grass to run in, sand to dig in and dirt to slide on. If you were a loner, there were bugs to crawl after, butterflies to try to capture, and clouds to imagine make shapes in. There were people to watch, shade to sit in and little rocks to kick. There was a whole world of adventure and it was just outside our classrooms in the schoolyard.
Even if the weather was terrible, we still got recess. Sometimes we got to go to the gym. There was basketball, foursquare and the dreaded dodge-ball. There might have been mats with balance beams, and some other things to crawl around on, or there might have been a stage where we could act like we were putting on a show. Sometimes we stayed in the classroom. Often the teacher would have planned ahead and we would have a fun activity that involved us all doing something with our hands while imagining with our minds.
I don’t have little kids anymore – mine are 20 and 21 now – but I sure hope that the little kids these days have the same opportunities that I had growing up. I hope they don’t just sit around texting and playing video games on their phones. It’s one thing to get outside and get some fresh air, but the exercise of the body and the mind are more important.
I LOVE this post and the images! It made my morning. I sure miss the monkey bars.
ReplyDeleteWhenever it rained, we'd stay in the classroom and play board games or Heads Up 7-Up and Eraser Tag.
Thanks, Marissa. I also remembered how when the bars were really cold, you had to warm up your hands with your breath before you grabbed them. Also - It was always a challenge to see who could clang the rings the loudest to be heard all across the playground.
ReplyDelete...have a echo way in the back of my head about these games you played - Heads Up 7-up and Eraser Tag - can't really remember them, though...
Lots of memories came flooding back with this post. I remember marbles and trying to not play the coolest ones in your bag (you might lose it and then they won't give you a chance to win it back).
ReplyDeleteMonkey bars. - still remember our graduating class "finding" one of those huge 1/2 orb ones and rolling it down the street on grad night and placing it on the front lawn of the highschool. Disclaimer: I only saw it on the lawn the next morning and wasn't part of the shinanigans.
Kill the Pig (tennis ball thrown against the wall and if you dropped it you had to run to the wall before someone beaned you in the back.
British bulldog. run from one side of the field to the other and someone tries to tackle you and then you join them in the middle to try and get the others.
After reading this I was picturing my grade school St John the Apostle. Our recess was in the parking lot. No fun things like monkey bars or swings. We did play hopscotch, jumprope and sometimes line tag. Boys would be flipping baseball and other trading cards.I mostly was a loner and read books. I can't remember what we did when the weather was too bad to go out there though. I do remember playing that 7-up game. I enjoyed reading about your recess memories.
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