What is the role that traditional games play in our contemporary life? Nowadays, we are towards the outrageous evolution of technology and every real game is replaced by a virtual one. Children are rarely involved in traditional games, adults almost at all, only under special circumstances. But, we have to know that games and especially traditional games that have been created for this reason are a basic and significant tool for non-formal education.
But, what non-formal education exactly is? Let me explain. According to mrs Triliva and Anagnostopoulou (writers of “Non-formal education, a manual for educators and psychologists”, Athens, 2008), non-formal education is a normal and humane process which includes the existence of teacher and school but not as the core of the procedure. This kind of education is a way of every-day learning through our ability to communicate with other people and cogitate what we have already learned by this immediate experience. We achieve non-formal education when we transmit this process in an educational level as an alternative way of learning where books and memorization are replaced by the immediate display of the student on the subject of the learning.
The main difference among a game and an educational game is educative traits. As a result, a game could teach something but the main goal is to be part of a recreational activity while an educational game could be entertaining but the objective is to teach people. The content of an educational game is to provide professional knowledge which could be received in other ways such as books, teaching, audiovisual material etc. Consequently, information and skills which will be attained through an educational game could be implemented in real work conditions.
There are a variety of greek traditional games. Some of them educational and some of them recreational. Let’s have some examples of educational games.
The King
King is one game of roles. Children choose one between them to become the king who is sitting somewhere and all the other children as a team take time and space in order to choose which job they will select and which gestures are the most appropriate for indicating their job. When they finish, they visit the king and they have the following conversation:
-Oh my king, my king, with your impressive sword, what is my job?
-Laziness of course!
-No, no, no!! Now guess, what is my job?
Then, children make the gestures of the job they choose. Only if the king understands what is the job, he becomes the hunter and the child that he grips becomes the king. Otherwise, he remains king and children imitate another profession.
The hangman
This is a game of 2 or 4 players but it could be pleasantly regarded by many people. We have a paper with the alphabet written in the middle and a hangman over it. At the bottom, we write the word that we want from our opponent to find, in dashes, as the letters are so the number of the dashes is. When the game begins the opponent tells us a letter of the alphabet and if this letter belongs to the hidden word, then we put it to the right place and we delete it from the alphabet. If the letter does not match with the hidden word, we start to “hang” the opponent, firstly drawing his head. The game is continuing until the opponent finds the word. If he doesn’t until body parts finish, the opponent is the loser.
And an example of recreational games.
The tissue
The tissue is a game which requires over six children, a tissue and a chalk. We use the chalk to draw a circle in the middle and two lines, right and left of the circle. The game’s goal is to be the first who will take the tissue by the middle. Children are separated in two groups and everyone child of the group has a number. When number one is heard, children who have the one as their number have to try to take the tissue by the center without being caught by his opponent. If he is caught, the point is for the opponent, but if the opponent passes the line, the point is for him. The team which has the majority of points is the winner.
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