How to Play Hungry Human Hippos

Get some carpet dollies or scooter boards with handles and make this happen. You can use long bungee cords like these or ropes to pull them back after they have collected as many balloons or ball pit balls as possible. Kids will never forget this.

Here are the rules:

1. A player is pushed by their team to the center of the room and attempts to grab (or place under a basket) as many balloons or balls as possible and return them to his or her team’s corner.

2. The scooter can NEVER STOP. As soon as the player reaches the center, he or she must be immediately pulled back.

3. You can either send the same player back to the center, or have the whole team rotate through being “hippos.”

4. Only balls that are completely in the team’s corner count as points. Balls will quickly become scattered around the room, and it is not enough to have balls “close” to a corner. If a ball is close, the team can send the hippo towards that ball instead of to the center.

5. The game ends when all of the balls are gone, or when the timer runs out.

NOTE: Please have students WEAR HELMETS. When players meet in the middle, the last thing you want to have happen is for their heads to smash in to one another.