Bored 3/29/13

The last final was Wednesday, and the kids go home Saturday.  With no classes or studying, the kids don't have much to do.  Wednesday night was movie night instead of Friday night, so I spent some time with the kids Wednesday afternoon, and slept at the school after the movie.  We watched the movie, "Megamind."  When I left the following morning, the kids were gathered around the courtyard.  They weren't gathered to bid me farewell, but it was clear that they didn't have much to do.

One of my favorite past times is playing cards.  It should have been no surprise to me that the kids also like to play cards, so that's what we did.  They taught me a French game that was similar to Hearts.  Only some of the cards in the deck are played, and the existing cards all have different values than their face:
6 - zero
7 - ten
A - eleven
J - three
Q - two
K - four

They wanted me to teach them a game, so I started with Spoons.  The object of the game, is to get one of the spoons in the middle of the table.  The game works by passing cards around the table.  You can exchange the cards with the cards in your hand, and you can try to get four of the same cards.  The first person that can take a spoon must have four cards that are the same.  Once one spoon is taken, anyone can take a spoon.  Since there were seven of us, there were six spoons.  The person who does not get a spoon loses the round.  After a few rounds, a number of us had lost at least one, so it was pretty well balanced.  They caught on pretty quickly to the game.  There was one game where I got four cards.  I reached from the end of the table to grab the FIRST spoon, and the girls playing were so quick, that I was the one without a spoon!

I don't think they know many games, so I plan to teach them more next term.  I found a few more decks of cards at the market for $0.33.  They are the worst decks I think I've ever seen, but they work.  The ones I found happen to have Coca-Cola and the movie Titanic on them.  :)  Go figure. 

When I shuffled and did a bridge to stack the cards back up, the kids were fascinated.  None of them knew how to shuffle, and I'm not sure they have seen someone shuffle.  So, I'm working on teaching them that as well.

Yesterday afternoon, Hanna and I also brought them hula hoops, string, and crayons and paper.