gym games

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looking for something really fun to do in the gym...

could be anything related to:
relay races
some kind of game to play during flexibility work (or during splits)
contest for skills
team building exercises for gym

Really, I'm just wanting to mix it up a little. I have some trivia games that we play while we sit in splits, and we do the regular "who can do the most push ups, v sits, etc in x amount of time", we have mat races, and we do other things...I just wondered if anyone had any ideas for something else?

I'm open to ideas from anyone and everyone!
 
I like to play "One frog" when I'm doing splits. The phrase is " One frog- jumped in - the lake -plop" It goes around in a circle and everyone says one part of the phrase. The first person would say "one frog," and the second person says "jumped in," the third says, "the lake," the fourth says "plop." Then the phrase starts over and the next person says "two frogs" and then each part of the phrase is said twice. So the fifth and sixth person says "two frogs, " the sixth and seventh says "jumped in" and so on. Then for three frogs every part of the phrase has to be said three times and so on.

Does that make sense?

If a person says the wrong words or takes too long to say it they are out, and when someone gets out it starts over again at one frog.
 
This is a great game that dd played last year at cheerleading. It is called "Shipwreck". Everyone starts out on the floor and the coach will call out the commands. There are certain things that the kids do in pairs, triplets and by themselves. For instance, pairs is lovers leap where one person will hold the other person in their arms, bunk beds, where someone holds the other persons ankles in a push up position, three men eating is with three people, shark is where they lay on their bellies with their hands over their head like a fin, cockroach is with them on their backs with their arms and legs up. The point is to have one last person standing. When the pairs and triplets pair up, the people who don't have a group to go to have to sitout....

I know I am not explaining it too well--I am getting tired!!! But the game incorporates conditioning exercises in a fun way.

Maybe someone else on this board can explain the game better!!!
 
You could do the two truths and a lie during spits (this is a get to know exercise but fun too).
Taking turns each person tells the group two true things about themself and one lie. They can be obvious or a real challenge. The rest of the group has to guess the lie.

I did a splits music circuit for my kids a couple of time, they absolutely loved it and they improved drastically, it had about 40 stations with all the activities! Included splits up the wall, kicks, splits on the floor, off and on mats, hanging from the bar, in handstand, jumping on tramp etc... Kids spent 30 seconds at each activity while appropriate music played. They had about 10 seconds of silence to rotate.

A neat game I learnt in a rec course was Puddles. Children skipped around (to music) and pointed their toe into the puddle as they passed it. As the game went on, the sequence grew longer: point, flex, and switch feet point, flex, four jumps in a circle, point.
I modified this for my competitive ones to learn the dance sequence of their floor routines, so much easier for the little ones to remember when it’s a game.

Relay races around the gym, Gymnastike (I think) have a video of one of the college teams having a conditioning relay race.

A good team builder is group handstand contest. Depending on the level of your gymnasts you assign so many seconds per gymnast i.e. 5 seconds then multiply by the number in the group i.e. 5. So as a group they need to do 25 seconds worth of handstand.
Time each gymnast individually so they can watch and cheer. If you are feeling generous you can let them nominate someone to go again if they have not met their target. My kid’s prize was that I had to condition with them! Doing the competition on the beam is a good way to let the want of winning over-ride the fear of falling.
 
Dd's coach last week took about 10 minutes and with her group and another they had relay races on the beams. They had to do certain things down the beam (hop on 1 foot, etc.) and then either do straight jump off or front tuck off and had to stick the landing.

The girls loved it, being that the oldest was 13, they did a lot of laughing and were ready to go for the rest of practice - they did the race at the beginning after warm-up.

I actually think the coach was killing some time while another group finished up on the event our girls were going to.
 
we used to do all sorts of relays and also put anything to music that your girls like and they'll get really into it and some even sing along!(we had the new Girls Aloud album on constantly:eek:)
 
Oh, just wanted to add that another thing that my dd has done (age 12, L8) was when they were on beam and there were other levels on floor, they would try to do their beam routines to the floor music that was being played. The girls had a lot of fun and didn't realize how many routines they actually did because they were trying to stay in tune to the floor music.
 
Tonight I am playing Survivor-Floor Routine with my level 4-6. I do this when the kids start to get a little sloppy and complacent during warm up and routine and i get tired of watching half efforts. Basically everyone starts the routine warm up and get voted off by me when they perform a skill that isn't up to their standard. Anyone who is left after warm ups gets to do a routine. They continue the routine as long as it looks good. I give points(kind of like monopoly money) to kids that make it all the way thru, the kids who were eliminated work on a list instead. It tends to wake up a few and they enjoy it and I get more quality and effort.
 
This is a skipping game we used to play:

Not last night but the night before
24 robbers came a knocking at my door
As I rushed out (run out of rope)
they rushed in (run back in other side)
and this is what they said:
Ballerina, ballerina turn around (spin round)
Ballerina, ballerina touch the ground (touch ground)
Ballerina, ballerina do the high kick,
Ballerina, ballerina do the splits! (in the actual game you stop the rope with one foot on either side, but we used to do a split leap in gym)

I know it's not much but its so much fun!!

We used to do the Cha Cha Slide in a handstand as well. And Handstand tig, when you get split into two teams, and the team that's not het has to run around the gym, and the team that's het has to catch them. Once you're caught you have to handstand till everyone is caught. And you can do it with splits etc too.

Hope this helps!!
 
these are all great! thank you to everyone!

Sometimes I find that when we keep doing the same games over and over, they tend to get boring, or the athletes "expect" what game comes when...It's great to switch it up once in a while - I've found that the kids get a little more excited when they know to "expect the unexpected". Thanks again for all the replies!
 
For warmups we like to play Toilet Tag and Bridge Tag (in the former when you get tagged, you've gotta pretend to be a toilet, and to get unfrozen a team mate has to "flush" you. In the latter, you do a bridge and a teammate crawls under your bridge).

During stretching with a lot of my rec classes we play the "tell me a skill that uses this position" game, and I also have them all show a bridge, then lay down, and will call an athlete to do another, who will call the next, and the next. during each bridge I tell them what they do REALLY well so the other kids can see it, and have them make it harder. THey like showing off their progress.

My rec kids also play "the teacher game", in which each kid gets to pick a skill, I will do it VERY VERY VERY badly, and they then have to show me how to do it correctly. Then I do it correctly, exaggerating the corrections they focused on.

We also do sticking contests. Their stuck jumps are given points based on difficulty, and an EXCEPTIONALLY pretty jump, or making a correction that we've talked about a few times, can get a style point. And of course there's add-on...but everyone plays that...
 
This is a great game that dd played last year at cheerleading. It is called "Shipwreck". Everyone starts out on the floor and the coach will call out the commands. There are certain things that the kids do in pairs, triplets and by themselves. For instance, pairs is lovers leap where one person will hold the other person in their arms, bunk beds, where someone holds the other persons ankles in a push up position, three men eating is with three people, shark is where they lay on their bellies with their hands over their head like a fin, cockroach is with them on their backs with their arms and legs up. The point is to have one last person standing. When the pairs and triplets pair up, the people who don't have a group to go to have to sitout....

I know I am not explaining it too well--I am getting tired!!! But the game incorporates conditioning exercises in a fun way.

Maybe someone else on this board can explain the game better!!!


This is kind of like my favorite game, but this originiated more for gymnastics. I'ts called chicken in the hen house, I actually played it at my birthday party! haha. There are groups of 2. Start out by having 2 circles running around, one partner in each circle. Then say out a call, and the partners scramble to each other, then do the move. The last one to do it is out and has to do conditioning or whatever.
Here are the calls:
Rodeo (piggy back ride)
Lovers Leap (partner leaps into the arms of the other partner)
London Bridges (One partner will do a back bend into a bridge and the other will crawl under)
Sailors Sit (On partner will kneel down with one leg up for the partner to sit on and both will salute)
Chicken in the Hen House (One partner will kneel on all fours and the other will kneel on the back of the partner)
Back-pack(piggy back)
Camp fire (Girls go back to back link arms and sit down)
Eiffel Tower [ One girl does a handstand and the other person catches it)
Circle Up (continue rotating and go back into the 2 circles)


Another game we used to also do was link tag.
You can do obstacle races across the gym, through the pit, etc.
A fun balancing game, is where you all stand on two beams facing each other. Grab a big block, like one of the ones little kids use, and chuck it at each other as hard as you can. They have to catch the block and try to keep their balance. If they fall off the beam, they have to go do conditioning.
On the tramp you can do, uhh what's the name called? Oh!! Add on haha. Like someone does a backhandspring, and then the next girl adds something. Then they can't repeat what they've done it has to go by memory.
Handstand contests are also fun, whether this is on the beam, or walking on the floor.
We used to have this big game board, with games in it, and we'd play it on the beam. When you got a skill you could move your game piece.
Anotherrr one that the optionals used to do was something called like Baseball? They drew a baseball field on a piece of paper. Each girl was given a hard assignment, something they've never done before. Example: Backhandspring backlayout step out on beam. If they got that, they could go to the next base on the paper, and the team with the most points could move on.

Andd the final one what we played at our team banquet was something with bandanas. You put it loosely in your belt loop [if you were in the gym you could tie it or something] and then there were 4 hoola hoops per team. You were to go off [only could go out of your hoola hoop if you had a bandana on] and grab everyones bandana. You wanted all of the bandanas.
 
We played this game at gymnastics camp where you throw assorted mats on the floor so that they are kinda random and there are a few feet between them. To make it more fun you can stack some mats, and have a few sting mats so the heights vary too. All the girls go on the floor and stand on a mat. The object of the game is to push other people off the mats so that if any part of your body touches the floor you are out. For a more difficult game take away a few mats. It gets vicious and can be hilarious if the girls are flexible because they will be completely bending over to push someone off.
It was my favorite game. :p
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We have been known to give the coaches puppy dog eyes and convince them to let us play capture the flag in the gym. It really has no gymnastics benefits though... but it's great for team bonding!

We play stick it- The coach says a skill to do off of the mini tramp and if you can stick it, hold for 3 seconds before you finish then you get a letter. S-T-I-C-K-I-T-! It's like HORSE for basketball. Or you can play that you don't get a letter if you stick it.
 
recently my gym held a Superstars competition wich included lots of fun competition with could also be used as just games. we did: pit race, high bounce on the trampolining, rope climb, circuit, handstand walks, balance on a low bar ( which i won i held it for 1min 10), step ups on a bench max in 30 secs, sprints on the track
 

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