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The UK's only online scouting magazine edited by a team of (mostly) young scouts.
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ISSN 2753-9970
GAMES

Camping Crossword
Issue 6

Ping Pong Games Evening
Issue 6
Ping pong or table tennis? Who knows? What's important is that scouts love anything that involves playing with balls whatever their size. Here are a few games that involve ping pong (or table tennis) balls. Maybe make an evening of them.
Blow Ping Pong
Equipment: 1 ping pong ball, 1 straw per scout, 1 wide table (or sheet of 8' x 4' hardboard) on a table, chairs
Put the scouts into two teams and put them sitting down either side of the table. Put the ball in the middle and the scouts have to attempt to blow the ball off the edge of the opposing team's end. The team that loses is out and the winning team splits in half and another round is played. Eventually you will have a winner. Balls that go off the long edge are a blow in for the team that didn't blow the ball off. (This can be worked out by the direction of the ball when it went off.)
Ping Pong Blow Football
Equipment: 10 ping pong balls
Put the scouts into two teams. Draw two parallel lines down the length of the hall, about two metres apart. Space ten ping pong balls down the middle. Put two more lines thirty centimetres outside the existing two lines. Teams line up along these outer lines. On "Go!" scouts have to blow the balls over the their opponents' inside line. The team that blows more balls over their opponents' line within a certain time is the winner. Any attempt to impede any ball's progress, apart from blowing, will result in disqualification.
Ping Pong Relay
Equipment: 1 stick, 1 marker cone and 3 ping pong balls per team
Put the scouts into teams behind a start line. On "Go!" the lead scouts have to use their stick to push the three balls up and round a marker cone and back over the line. Other team members do the same. The first team to finish is the winner. Don't make the course too long, it can take forever! For even more fun use irregular shapes like conkers or potatoes.
Pass the Ping Pong
This can be really difficult. It just depends who's on your team!
Equipment: 1 straw per scout, 1 ping pong ball per team
Put the scouts into teams, lined up with their straws. The lead scouts suck their balls onto the ends of their straws. On "Go!" the second scouts suck the balls onto their straws as the lead scouts stop sucking. Hopefully the ball will pass from one straw to the next. Play continues down the line. Once at the end it can go back up the line. The first team to complete the game is the winner. If at any time the ball is dropped it goes back to the last scout to have it stuck on the end of their straw for a restart.
Ping Pong 1,000
Equipment: 1 ping pong ball, pen and paper
The scouts face you from about five metres away down the hall. Throw the ping pong ball down to the ground about halfway between you and the scouts. As you do so, shout out a number between 100 and 1000. The scout that catches the ball from that first bounce gets that score. If the ball bounces again then the score is halved. The first scout to reach 2000 is the winner and becomes the thrower.
Ping Pong 5,000 I
Equipment: 100 ping pong balls, marker pen, bucket
Mark ten balls with 100, ten with 200 and so on, up to ten with 1,000. Put them all in a bucket. Scouts disperse in the hall. Tell them that they can only pick up a maximum five balls and any scout seen holding more will be disqualified. Then throw the bucket, holding onto it, so that all the balls fly into the air. The scout whose balls total the most is the winner.
Ping Pong 5,000 II
Equipment: 100 ping pong balls, marker pen, bucket, pen and paper
Mark ten balls with 100, ten with 200 and so on, up to ten with 1,000. The scouts face you from about five metres away down the hall. Tell them that they can only have five balls and once they have that many they need to bring them to you, then sit down. Throw or bounce the balls at them, one at a time, but fairly quickly. Have another leader on standby to add up each scout's five balls, record the totals and put the balls back in the bucket. These can be reused if necessary. Once all the scouts have collected five balls, the scout whose balls total the most is the winner.
Ping Pong Downpour
Equipment: Bucket, loads of coloured ping pong balls
Mark a large circle that the scouts must stay out of at all times. Put a bucket in the middle of the circle. Put the scouts into teams and give each team a load of one colour of ping pong balls. On "Go!" they have to bounce the balls into the bucket. Any balls that come out of the circle can be reused, those that stay in the circle can't. When no scout has any balls left, count the balls in the bucket. The team with most in the bucket is the winner.
Ping Pong Planting
Equipment: 50 ping pong balls in a bowl, 25 plastic cups
Put the cups all over the hall. At one end have the balls in a bowl. Put the scouts into four teams. Three teams are planting, the other team is digging up. On "Go!" the teams that are planting take one ball at a time and plant them in the cups. The teams that are digging up take them out of the cups and bring them back to you. Digging up scouts can carry no more than five balls at a time. After two minutes stop the game and count the number of balls in the cups. That number is the digging up team's score. Play three more rounds, each time with a different team digging up. After four rounds the digging up team with the lowest score is the winner. For a variation have no more than one ball in one cup.
Ping Pong Puff
Equipment: 1 Ping pong ball and 1 plastic spoon per scout
Give each scout a spoon and a ball which they balance in the bowl. On "Go!" scouts have to attempt to be the last one to keep their ball in the bowl. No physical contact is allowed. No touching of the spoon by any part of the body is allowed, apart from holding the handle. The only thing that you can do is try and dislodge balls by blowing. When a ball is blown off, the scout must retrieve it and leave the playing area.
Ping Pong Archery
This one sorts out the scouts who think they're real men or women from the ones who actually are! Bouncing a ping pong ball into a dustbin from five metres away isn't easy.
Equipment: Ping pong balls, dustbin or umbrella and empty tin can, chalk, length of wood, pen and paper
Put the scouts into teams. Put the dustbin or opened umbrella sitting on tin can in the centre of the hall and mark concentric circles round it. Make the first one three metres in diameter, the next one four metres and so on up to ten. Scouts stand behind one of the circles. Give the scouts standing round the nearest circle a ping pong ball each which they have to, in turns, bounce into the dustbin. Any that succeed gain one point for their team. Then give the balls to the scouts behind the next circle. They score two points, and so on. The team with most points, after everyone has had a go, is the winner. As a variation mark a line with chalk or using a length of wood. Scouts sit down and come up one time each as the chalk line or wood is moved back thirty centimetres at a time, with the score increasing at the line moves further away from the bin.

Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games
Issue 4
My name is Tibor and I am the cub leader for the 44th Croydon Air Scouts. I have had the privilege again this summer to have been involved with the Paralympics. It has been a hard time for everyone over the past two years and touch and go that this great sporting event in Tokyo would even happen. So to experience the joy, pride and positive nature of these super athletes that they could represent their countries and take part in the Games that they have worked so hard for was an unbelievable experience.
I have been involved with these Games since 2012 and made some great friends with the athletes. It was fantastic to see them again and to make some new friends too. This year was more special personally for me for two reasons. These Games proved that even though the world had gone through such a hard time and all of the athletes had to overcome even tougher hardships than normal and to overcome recent personal tragedy with the added event of the pandemic they never gave up. It is very inspiring. I met many new athletes that had overcome tragic accidents or had been disabled from birth who told me their stories of how they had persevered and not let their disability stop them achieving their goals. This one stuck with me the most: Justin at the age of eighteen was an up-and-coming high school athletic star; unfortunately he was shot and his spine was damaged. This left him paralysed from below the waist. Five months after leaving hospital he decided to call his local adaptive sports federation to enquire about wheelchair sports. He then tried various sports and eventually took on the Javelin as an event. His sheer determination combined with great coaching and help from his fellow athletes saw him representing his country just six years later. He was such a positive person who never gave up. He was so proud, excited and grateful to be at these Games. It was humbling and a privilege to meet him and all of the other athletes.
He and all the other athletes from around the world showed greater strength and determination. The pandemic was not going to stop them achieving their goals and to show the world how we can unite through hope, determination and the joy of sport. To me it also embodied the values of scouting we all follow - integrity, respect, care and belief - that all the athletes from all around the world showed in these Games.
Secondly it gave the world this year a further message. "We The 15" is sport's biggest ever human-rights movement to end discrimination. Its aim is to transform the lives of the world's 1.2 billion people with disabilities who represent fifteen percent of our global population and to make the world aware that discrimination is still there towards those with disabilities. It's a campaign to build a greater knowledge of the barriers and the discrimination that people with disabilities face on a daily basis at all levels of society. Furthermore that we need to break down these barriers so all people with disabilities can fulfil their full potential and be respected as vital members of our society. As a cub leader I am proud both individually and as a member of the scouting movement that does not discriminate against those with disabilities and in fact embraces and encourages those individuals to join and grow and play a vital role in making scouting fun and rewarding for all.
Through our help and encouragement maybe one day we will see one or more of our ex beavers, cubs or scouts in the future standing on the podium receiving their medal.
Tibor, Cub Leader, 44th Croydon Air Scouts

FIGURE OF 8 BINGO
A game that can be played over the internet
Issue 2
Thank you to everyone who let us know how much they enjoyed playing Sssssnake Bingo from Issue 1 with their young people. Although it was designed to be played over the internet it doesn't have to be, it can be played with everyone present in person.
What we like about Sssssnake Bingo is that, apart from the template, it is a DIY game where participants get to choose where to place their own numbers. The same is true for Figure of 8 Bingo which moves from going in one direction to going in four. This keeps everyone on their toes. It is also a much quicker game because you have four chances of crossing off a number each time instead of just one.
How to play Figure of 8 Bingo
The object of the game is to cross off all the numbers called.
Print off the blank template. A copy can be downloaded here. You will need one per player.
There are fifty squares. In the larger box at the intersection everyone puts in number 1.
Each player puts the numbers 2 to 50 in the squares of their figure of 8 in a random order. One number per square, no duplicates / omissions.
Starting at 1, players take it in turn to call out any number. Players whose next number to be crossed off in any of the four directions from the number 1 matches the number called each time can cross it off.
The first person to cross off all the numbers on their figure of 8 is the winner. There may be more than one winner.

SSSSSNAKE BINGO!
Issue 1
A game that be played over the internet
During lockdown we've been playing more than our fair share of bingo over the internet. Ours differs from online bingo where you play on established websites against hundreds of other people whom you don't know and lose loads of money. Our internet bingo was based on downloading bingo cards and nominating one of the players as the caller each time. However it soon became apparent that the only reason for using pre-printed bingo cards was to lessen the chances of more than one player calling "Bingo!" at the same time - something that wasn't really much of a problem between friends. We had been playing so many games that we were beginning to run out of sources of free cards. The answer wasn't long in coming - make our own! We researched the various types of bingo card and then decided that we would throw the rules out of the window and write our own.
Since we started on these new cards we have honed the cards and the rules but Sssssnake Bingo! was one of our first reincarnations. We will include others in future editions of Scout and Scouting but for now enjoy the fruits of our thoughts!
How to play Sssssnake Bingo!
The object is to get from the tail to the head by crossing off the numbers called.
Print off the template, one per player per game.
There are twenty-five white squares. Each player writes the numbers one to twenty-five in the white squares of their sssssnake in a random order. One number per square, no duplications / omissions.
Players take it in turn to call out a number. Any player whose next number to be crossed off going up the sssssnake matches the number called each time can cross it off.
The first person to get to the sssssnake's head by crossing off all the numbers is the winner.
Do you have any great games? Write to us at info@searchlinepublishing.co.uk
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