Water is a popular game from the Rhodesian culture. It can be played inside or outside with 6 to 20 players. Students compete in two teams and run around a split field, trying not to get tagged from the opposing team. The two teams (example: X and O) are split on each half of the field, and the O team has to go into the X team's territory one at a time. The X team players are given certain chunks of area to guard, and if an opponent steps into the territory, the players can try to tag him. Each member who makes it to the end of X team's territory and back into the O team's territory earns a point. For every player who is tagged, the whole team is out and the turn switches to the opposite side.
A classic word game that can be played with the whole class, hangman especially is useful for words the class is learning how to spell and read that week. The teacher can use the chalkboard and pick a word from that week's spelling list. The rest follows the rules of the game hangman. Students can either play for themselves or be put into teams that each get a turn to pick a letter in order to guess the word before the hangman is all drawn. The winning team or student can then get a treat or pick the next word and draw it out on the board.
This game works well with groups larger than 15. Students work in groups of three or four. The teacher calls out an arithmetic equation such as 5 plus 7. Then students have to show that number by either partnering with other teams to make twelve or show another way of making twelve such as physically make a shape of a one and two.
This is a great game for any subject: social studies, science, math or language. Students make cards (in groups of two or three) about the size of a regular deck of cards. Then, depending on the subject, they draw on a total of 12 cards (or any even number). If social studies is chosen as a subject, then students draw out or write the same image on a pair of cards. If students are studying the provinces of Canada, one pair of cards would be Ontario's shape on two different cards.
Once all the cards are made, they're shuffled and flipped over so that the students can't see what the symbol they drew on it was. The cards are laid out in neat rows, and students try to find the matches based on their memory. The cards can be switched with other groups to see what social studies subject they chose to draw. To increase the challenge, card decks can be combined and put on a massive table for the whole class to take part in.