Saturday, June 27, 2015

Whales, Whales, Whales

Fun learning board game.


The Game Board


Two blue file folders were taped together on the reverse side. 

I am going to be remaking this board as the duct tape I used has caused a reaction over the years and spoiled the board, though the children do not seem to mind it at all. I have used clear packing tape and it has never caused this reaction, but I was out the day I made this. Lesson learned!

The whales were copied from an old book I owned. I enlarged them a bit. The cute bubble-look stickers are those reinforcements to be used when the holes in notebook paper tears.  NOTICE that the path is a circular one, which means it has no beginning and no end.

Fun Fact Cards

 The fun fact cards are interesting information about the 10 whales on the board. There are 5 cards for each whale.
These cards are also part of the fun facts deck. Even though the cards appear to be a different color, they are not. These are the cards that make the playing so much fun. Our rules are:  

Draw - the player blindly selects a card from other player's fanned out cards.
Give - the player chooses which card(s) to be given.
Exchange - each player chooses which card will be given.
Pass - each player chooses the card to be given. 

Whale Cards 


There are 5 of each of the 10 whales. There are also 12 WILD WHALE CARDS.

To Play:

Both decks are shuffled and placed in separate draw piles. 

Players each select a game piece and place it on any of the whales on the board.

In turn, a player draws the top Fun Face card and reads it aloud. He then follows the directions about moving on the card. Play is in a clock-wise direction.

Every time a player lands on or crosses a whale on the game board, he draws a whale card from the draw pile. If the player crosses on a backward move he draws a whale card. On his next turn if he again crosses the whale he collects another card.

THE OBJECT OF THE GAME:

Be the first player to have one of each of the 10 whales in their hand. (For a shorter game the number of different whales can be lowered.) As soon as a player has the required whales (he may have extras too) he lays the whale cards down. 

THE STRATEGY:

The older children love this because of the extra strategy. If you remember which cards players have drawn from you or you gave them before, it is a wise play to give the the same one again. 

WILD WHALE CARDS:

These whale cards can be used as any whale needed. The children like to play that you can use as many WILD cards in your set of 10 as you need. 

THINK OF THE POSSIBILITIES of this game format. 


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