Wink-Ums

  • Grades 3-5

  • No equipment needed

Development Goal

To develop strategic thinking and non-verbal communication.

Before You Start

  • You will need chairs (enough for 1/2 number of players plus one extra)
  • Demonstrate safe tagging:
    • Light touch, like butterfly wings on the shoulder
    • Unsafe Tags: hard contact that might cause the person being tagged to fall
  • Demonstrate how to stand behind the chair with your head down and hands behind your back
  • Demonstrate how to sit in the chair

Set Up

Make a circle with the chairs

How to Play

  • Divide the group in half. Have one group sit in the chairs and the other group stand behind the chairs.
  • There should be one chair with no one sitting in it but has a player standing behind it, they are the “winker”.
  • The players standing behind the chairs should have their head down and hands behind their back.
  • The players sitting should look at the winker and sit all the way back in their chair.
  • If the winker winks at a sitting player they need to try and sneak away from their chair and make it to the empty chair without being tagged by the student behind them.
  • If tagged, players switch positions (sitting player stands behind their original chair and standing player takes a seat) and the same winker tries again. If not tagged, the player standing behind the new empty chair becomes the winker.