• Pre K/K

  • Balls

Development Goal

To develop teamwork, verbal communication and hand-eye coordination.

Before You Start

Skills Practiced:  Throwing, catching, fielding, batting, base running and position playing.

  • Additional equipment needed: tennis balls or plastic wiffle balls, bases, baseball tee or a tall cone, one plastic or foam bat.
  • Set up the field with the bases and with mark the tee as home plate.
  • Review the concepts of Softball and Baseball that you want to teach throughout the game.
  • Review safety rules, especially the Swing, Drop, Run rule for the batting.
  • Teach the game to the students and then ask them to explain the game back to you.
  • Demonstrate hitting, running the bases and fielding (with a pass to a teammate).

How to Play

  • Divide students into two teams.
  • The fielding team gets distributed in their positions; everyone is in the field, even if you need to have more than nine in the field.
  • Give the batting team a batting order and line them up in a safe area to the side of the field.
  • This game is played following the softball & baseball rules; with the exception that the pitcher does not pitch the ball to the batter.
  • You are the pitcher and control the play of the game. Play starts when you place the ball on the tee and the batter hits the ball off the tee.
  • Play stops when the ball is returned back to you.

Teams switch sides when either:

  • Three outs are scored
  • A time limit is reached
  • After the team batting rotation.

Variations

  • Throw ball.  The fielding team is set up in the regular baseball/softball format. The batter throws the ball into the field from home plate and then proceeds to run the bases.
  • Fielders can catch a thrown ball in the air or tag the runner for an out, just like in regular baseball.
  • Play ends when the catcher at home plate has the ball.
  • This is a good alternative when the yard is too crowded to risk someone getting hit by a batted ball or a swinging bat.
  • For young grades, have students run the bases without calling outs.