Where we grew up Dodge Ball was played in a circle, not a square. Playing dodgeball in a square was called Prison Dodge. Go figure.

The Rules: Sometimes one kid or a team of kids was in the circle. The people on the outside would bean the ball at the kid(s) in the circle. (The PC way is to gently throw with accuracy, but kids will be kids.)

If a kid inside caught the ball you had to go inside too. Last one on the outside was the winner.

The other way to play (sometimes known as Prison Dodge, or Bombardment) works like this:

You split all the kids into two teams. You divide your playing space in half. You need to have a line for the middle of the court, where all the balls are lined up to begin the game, and also two lines on either side of the halfway line where kids cannot cross. Once you blow the whistle kids can run out from the back line and grab a ball if they get to one first. Then the dodgeball action begins...

If you are on one team you cannot cross the opposing team's far line, but you can cross the mid-way point of the court, so you can approach the other team's players as they try to hide back in the safe area. The safe area is also the other team's jail. So if you get hit, you have to run across or go outside the area and sit in the other teams jail until someone catches a ball, or makes a basket, which frees all the players in jail on one side! The last team to have someone left (not in jail) wins. The game can be played with 4 teams, but this makes for a lot of confusion. It is best to split up the kids into two equaly groups.

We hope you have fun playing (and can play nice at) Dodge Ball!

We'd love to hear the games you played when you were young. Share them with your friends on GettingOutside.