conkers - playground games

[justcarol67]

> Do you play hopscotch in the US?  What about french skipping?
> 
> Sarah xx

Carol:
When I was in elementary school, ages ago, we had a hopscotch pattern
(whatever it's called) painted right onto an asphalt section of the
playground. All the little girls played it (by the rules--we taught
each other). It was that or jumprope. When I got older and attended a
different school, we played "Chinese hopscotch" (all squares, no
two-footed rectangles and no rounded space at the end) or jacks (with
a golf ball) or dodgeball. We were required to wear skirts or dresses
to school--no pants even on very cold days and three feet of snow--so
our activities were more limited than the boys. (We also played string
games like cat's cradle and there was a spool-knitting fad when I was
in seventh grade. You could do that and talk at the same time.)

These days I have no idea what the children play, but I saw a colored
hopscotch diagram on a carpet in a children's waiting room the other
day, but the little girl who was trying to play it had no idea that
you were supposed to throw the rock in every square in sequence and
that if you step on a line, you lose your turn. (At least, that's how
we played it when I was a child.)

French skipping? Is that some sort of jumprope game?

Blue bells, cockle shells, eevey, ivy, over.

Carol