Game Over!

Yesterday I dismantled my giant gameboard.

In case you didn’t know, I work in the children’s department of the local public library.  And I built a giant gameboard for our summer reading program.

Blame it on the Smithsonian.

I had been tooling around the internet and noticed an article about a giant chess board at the Smithsonian.  While discussing summer programming with the children’s staff, I said, “Hey, the Smithsonian has a giant gameboard.” And my boss said, “Make it so.” Or something like that.  (Probably more like, “Ooh! Wouldn’t that be cool!”)

So I did.  I made a giant gameboard.

How did I start?  I googled “giant game board”, saw tons of chess and checker boards.  But I wanted a different kind of game, one that could be adapted to our summer theme, “One world, many stories”.  A homeschooling mother had devised a game using cardboard squares spread all over the floor, making a giant die out of a box.  The kids had to answer study questions correctly to move ahead.  A teacher had devised a game using questions from the class study of space.  I needed to use the resources at hand.  I had 60 carpet sample squares, and a theme.  How could I tie “One world, many stories” and the library together?  Books, world, books, world… Each book is a world unto itself, right?  My questions could pertain to the various worlds in various books. 

Next I worked out the mechanics of the game.  I chose travel to be my vehicle—a journey around the board to a destination.  A departure square and an arrival square.  Three squares that sent the player ahead one or two spaces.  Three squares that sent the player back two or three spaces.  Two detour squares—one that sent the player significantly ahead, the other sending the player back.  Six question squares (answer them correctly, move ahead extra spaces).

Eight weeks of summer reading, and I wanted to rotate the questions.  So I wracked my brain to come up with 48 questions, six per week, drawn from books our young patrons might have read.  Curious George—Africa.  Madeleine—France.  Babar—Celesteville.  You get the idea.

All the directions cards and questions were laminated for durability (they had to hold up for two months), and I duct-taped them fast to the carpet squares.  The question squares were a special challenge because I wanted to change them every week.  I put each question card inside a plastic sleeve and left the opening side open when duct-taping them to the carpet squares.  Then I trimmed the answer cards to fit under the plastic sleeve, just peeking out so that the kids could see the “Pull out for answer” I had typed at the top.

Now the fun.  Scrambling around on the floor, arranging the squares.  I made duct-tape arrows from one square to the next to indicate the direction of the game.  Then I walked through, stopping at each instruction to make sure I progressed satisfactorily.  At one point I discovered that one square sent you ahead two spaces, where you landed on a square that sent you back two spaces.  You could be stuck in the game forever!  Rearrange!

I found some square gift boxes, stuffed them with packing paper, covered them with colored paper, and stuck adhesive spots for the dice pips (using a “real” die to make sure the pip positions were in the correct places).  Then I covered them with clear Contac paper for durability.  (In hindsight, I should have covered them with colored duct tape and made the spots out of a contrasting color of duct tape.)

I posted a direction sign on an easel next to the game, and waited for the players.  Once the kids found out about it, it was a hit.  Brothers and sisters, grandmas and grandkids, teenagers, everyone wanted to try it out.  We tried to keep a tally (libraries love stats).  Our best week saw about 100 players.  Solitary players grabbed total strangers to play with them.  Kids tossed me the die when they were finished, saying, “That was a good game.”

It was awesome.

I changed the questions every week to keep the game fresh (after the first time through, the kids had memorized the answers).  While most of our patrons are generally not prolific or avid readers, I noticed occasionally a book which was mentioned in my game going off the shelf.

I’d made three dice.  The first two disintegrated after copious patching (with duct tape), the third badly dented by the end of the eight weeks.  (A few small patrons mistook them for soccer balls, apparently.  Or a good place to sit.)  The gameboard tape was curling at the edges, and the plastic sleeves on the question squares had to be replaced halfway through.  After two months, the duct tape arrows were skewed and twisted.

My game had lived a good life.

Now, for my next trick…

Could be a giant maze made out of duct tape.  Or a giant jigsaw puzzle (I have a giant cardboard box propped against my desk for that).  Or maybe an igloo made from milk jugs…