Monday 24 June 2019

St Mary's Universal Arcade 2018

Remember our inaugural St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017? This is the post for our 2018 edition! It has been nostalgic looking at these pix from a year ago, as we go forth with preparations for this coming year's rendition... From 2017 to 2018, we retained our more popular games and added some new ones. But everyone still had loads of fun! Come have a look!
Universal Arcade Ticket Booth
As you enter St Clare's Hall, you would see our friendly volunteers at the Ticketing Stand. Look at that awesome TICKETS sign board - handmade by Pauleen and her kids! So professionally done, ain't it? Here, you use your funfair coupons to buy our Universal Arcade tickets for the bouncy castle, or to play our awesome games. 
Next you may wish to peruse the prizes up for grabs at the Prize Redemption Booth which is just behind the Ticketing Stand. All prizes you see unique and the only ones available, so you need to redeem them before they get snapped up by someone else. This is because all our prizes are crowd-sourced - donated from friends and family and people around us. In this day and age, most of us in Singapore are blessed with an abundance of material stuff. Thus, we ask around for people to donate to us gifts which they have and are not using, items which they have a surplus of... New items would be wonderful, but we even accept used items in very good condition. :)
Some people were very kind and offered to sponsor a gift or asked us what they can get, to donate. So here is the low down... in particular, we are looking for
- new remote control cars/helicopters/drones (that kids love)
- new electrical appliances (that adults love)
- new or used toys/games in good condition
- new activity/craft/experiment sets

Generally, stuff which you think kids would like. Pass stuff to the person who told you about this call for donations. If there is lots you wish to donate, we can arrange for someone to pick up stuff from you. Anything not suitable for prize redemption, we will donate to our church thrift store. So feel free to pass us stuff you can spare. Best by end of June, if not then latest by mid-July. If you don't know who to contact, whatsapp Pamela @ 94301421.
On with the tour! As usual, we had our Bouncy Castle for the young ones to expend their energy, and for their caregivers to have a breather! ;p And while the adults wait for their kids, our coffee corner provided them with fragrant, hot piping coffee, along with a selection of home baked cake and cookies! This coffee stand fulfilled the dream of a number of our team mates to run a cafe in their lifetime :)
Coffee, tea, or me? :)
Next up, a new game! E-Current! We made two sets of the game, of differing difficulty level. You're supposed to run a metal ring through the curvy metal route without touching it. Doing so would connect the circuit and trigger the alarm - a light and a buzzer. See the young gentleman in red tee in the lower right hand picture? He is R, one of our pioneer Children's Liturgy graduates! He took a break from manning his chye tow kuay store downstairs to come lend us a hand! So sweet, eh?! He must have been selling black carrot cake! hehehe...
E-Current - The Electrifying Game! 
We brought back the old favourites. Channel Captain America as you throw the mini-shields into the rectangular holes in the banner in Shield of Faith. With so many lobangs in the banner, how can you miss?! 
Shield of Faith - The Captain America game. 
Slide the cars down the ramp to Park Your Car into any of the three garages! Get the most stamps if you manage to park your car in the smallest garage. Skid your car to victory!
Park Your Car - The Valet Speed Parking Game
Do you have Inner Peace? Sure, you do! Show us your Inner Peace by stacking all 7 of the pandas onto the wheel using chopsticks! You can do it, we know you can! See the look of concentration on their faces!
Inner Peace - The Panda Stacking Game with Chopsticks But No Dunplings!
Our most eye catching, most popular game - F1 Rally! Look how we have improved our race track from the Poke Kart track of the year before! After we got the wood from Triple Eyelid Studio, Peter volunteered to take charge of this project. With the help of his wife Ivy and their boys, they cut the wood, sanded the surfaces, painted them, screwed on hinges, designed and playtested their Formula One racetrack. The result was this brilliant looking track that worked very well!
F1 Rally - The Game of Precision Driving!
Nerf Wars - The Game Where You Shoot the Dark Side, of course!
What's a funfair without it's shooting games? Here are two! Shoot up the bad guys with a space age Nerf gun (above). Or hone your sharpshooting skills at Howdy's Shooting Range using traditional rubber band guns. 
Can you shoot straight and aim for the bullseye at Howdy's Shooting Range? 
In 2018, the lovely people from our parish's Catechesis of the Good Shepherd (CGS) ministry teamed up with us to help source for prizes as well as man game stalls on the actual days of the funfair. Their offer to man stalls came right after we discussed our worries for lack of manpower on the actual days - see how God answers our prayers! :)

We rethemed our Villians throwing game, to a Dinosaur theme. We figured that even villians need a second chance eh. So let's throw stuff at pictures of prehistoric animals that don't exist anymore! No animals were hurt in the process, we promise!
Universal Arcade 2018: Eggs Run, Slinky Elly, Pin It On Me!, Dino Slam
We had two new games: Slinky Elly and Pin It On Me!

Slinky Elly - Players wear a head band on their forehead which has a slinky attached to it, flowing down, much like an elephant's trunk. Within a set time frame, players need to use the slinky to knock down bottles on the floor. 

Pin It On Me! - Players are blindfolded, turned around three times. Listening to verbal cues from their friend/parent, they and need to pin a magnet onto the donkey's butt.

These two games didn't cause huge waves, but we noticed they were quite a hit with the younger ones, the preschoolers. And boy did they have fun with! We even overheard some of the mums taking photos and saying to each other that they can use these two games for their next birthday party! :) You're welcomed!!!
The Game That Should Be Called "The Triwizard Tournament Mazes"
Our marble run mazes where you have a number of checkpoints to get to before time's up, were as popular as ever. However, last but not least, one of our most popular games ever - Flush It! Everyone loves clean toilet humour, and our 'toilet bowls' are definitely clean! ;p
Flush It - The Toilet Bowl Game
So that was Universal Arcade 2018 of Church of St Mary of the Angels, Bt Batok, Singapore -  brought to you by St Mary's Children's Liturgy + CGS Team. We not only teach kids about Jesus, we show them how to have good clean, device-free fun too! 
Universal Arcade 2018 even had its very own two homegrown radio talk show deejays Jo & Kelvin!!!
This year, for 2019, we are changing most of the games... so come 3rd and 4th August 2019 you need to come check us out to play our games... but most of all, you need to go turn out your cupboards and storeroom now to pass us the good stuff that you haven't been using anyway!  Marie Kondo your stuff our way, please! :)
We need your help!!! :) 

Wednesday 14 November 2018

Cognitive Whizz's Science Escapade

Earlier this year, the twins were invited to join in Cognitive Whizz's Science Escapade workshop in  June. The twins have always loved science, and so have Iz and I actually. In fact, Iz was sulking - he wanted to join the science camp too! He couldn't attend as he was "over-aged" at 11 years old - the June Science Escapade was meant for ages 4 to 8.

Being 4 half days long (9.30am to 12.30pm each day), the camp took up practically a whole week. We had to shift other stuff around to make time for this camp, since the twins were keen on it. We hoped it was worth it, for you can't get back time spent.

I was also intrigued by the Science Escapade blurb on the poster as it mentioned famous kids books author Julia Donaldson and the characters in her books like Stick Man and Superworm. The kids and I have always loved reading and books, so this was a draw for us.
Science Escapade by Cognitive Whizz
Each day's lesson starts with Denise, the main trainer, asking the kids how they are feeling that day. Using flash cards and facial expressions and body language, she demonstrates a variety of feels and introduces a pretty good range of vocabulary to the kids.

Here are some of the words I managed to take note of: exultant, joyous, astonished, despondent, remorseful, daunted, jittery, vexed, frustrated and enraged. Out of so many words introduce, Denise would go on to focus on 4 words each day. Thus by the end of the 4 half day camp, the kids would have learnt the meaning of 16 words.

Given that the target age group is from ages 4 to 8 - this is quite a good standard of vocabulary. I was very impressed and surmised that it's a Science main course with a free English side. Isaac though, raised his eyebrows and whispered to me "I thought you said this was a Science camp?"

Next up, a dramatic reading of one of Julia Donaldson's books. The book for the first day was Stick Man.  I was indeed starting to wonder when the Science would come in... At the end of the book, we had our answer. The reading of the book and it's story, was to lead us in to the science! The kids were to help Stick Man get home to his family, by building a catapult to help him get home! Ah! Using the catapult and other examples, Denise proceeded onto the day's lesson to teach the kids the concept of Levers. Ingenious leading in! A nice touch!

Making the catapult
Denise discussed with the kids and introduced to them the concept of how elastic potential energy is turned into kinetic energy. The kids were provided with ice cream sticks, rubber bands and a spoon, to make their own catapult with - to fly Stick Man home! They all got to test out their constructions with a styrofoam ball as the load.

In another segment, Denise taught the kids how to identify the following in every lever
1. Effort
2. Load
3. Fulcrum

Next she got the kids to identify the above three parts of a lever in everyday items such as a shovel, tongs, ice cream scoop, a nutcracker etc. The kids even got the chance to crack their own nut.

Throughout the morning, in between segments, the facilitators would get the kids to stand and do certain exercises. There was the morning hello segment, and other activities that would get the kids up and moving as well. For young kids, movement like that is very welcomed, and I could see how allowing the kids to move now and then helped settle them and made it easier for them to sit still and do stuff at the table. It was a good balance that worked well.

The kids also got to make their own table-top basketball game which uses a small catapult to launch the ball into the hoop.

All in all, a very eventful morning, chock full of science theories and activities. This would prove to be typical for all four mornings.
Day 1:  Levers
Day 2: Pulleys and wheels
Day 3: Acid and alkali (base) 
Day 4: Air pressure

Lots of content, delivered in simple ways, to engage the kids and capture their attention. Key concepts and key words would be repeated over and over again to help embed this information in the children's minds.

Lever: Effort, Load, Fulcrum!
Cognitive Whizz is the brainchild of Denise. She has been conducting lots of hands-on science experiments with her kids since they were toddlers. With encouragement from her friends and family, she decided to run these holiday science camps so that more children can experience science in such fun and engaging ways.

Denise, as the main trainer, is excellent. Her energy level is consistently high, and her exuberance is contagious. Whether she is reading from a book or flash cards, or demonstrating a concept or experiment, she is clear and concise, energetic and loud enough. Many a time, the experiments are so engaging and interesting, that the kids tend to crowd forward just coz they're so excited! But Denise is able to be firm, yet kind, in telling them to sit back down so that everyone can see what is going on.

It also helps that they have a very good Facilitator to Participant ratio. In a class of less than 20 participants, there seems to be at least 4 to 5 facilitators, in addition to the main trainer. This translates to 1 Facilitator to 4 or 5 Participants - which is very decent. This results in the participants getting lots of 1 to 1 attention when they break into groups when to do their hands-on work. I eavesdropped on the facilitators as well - they're good! They know their content well, and are able to guide the kids effectively, and calm them down when the kids get too excitable or rowdy.

Overall, I was very impressed with the quality of science concepts taught. There were topics which I thought was quite advanced but Denise managed to simplify them concisely and teach the concepts to the kids. To top this off, I truly appreciate how Denise and her facilitators were able to manage the children without resorting to shouting or threats - as I have seen many educators do. I like how Denise uses positive and respectful language with the kids. This in turn sets the tone right for how the facilitators treat the kids, and how the kids behave towards one another. All in all, Cognitive Whizz has my full endorsement - highly recommended!

Cognitive Whizz - A Science Escapade! 2018
This time round, there are Disney characters involved! What's more, this time round, Cognitive Whizz has teamed up with Kidz Amaze @ Toa Payoh as a venue partner. Thus, every participant of the 4 half day (morning) Science Escapade can pop out for lunch and come back into Kidz Amaze and play for the rest of the afternoon till 7pm, for all four days! What a great deal!

I hear the December dates are pretty much filled, but if you're quick, you may still be able to register for the first run! Quote "TFC" before 17 November to get a special promo rate of $290. If you're to sign up for only one camp this holidays - let this be the one! 

Sunday 8 July 2018

St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017

Remember my DIY Carnival Games? It started with me making the games for my three kids to play. Then we brought them to a few family gatherings where they provided much amusement... Next we tried it out with our church group gathering of more than ten families and it was a hit! And because our church group loved it (pictures here), we decided to give it a try using these carnival games as our main contribution to our Church of St Mary of the Angels' Feast Day celebrations last year. 

Our biggest attraction, literally, was the bouncy castle. It was HUGE! In fact, we had to carefully position the bouncy castle so that the lights and fans suspended from the ceiling would not be disturbed. We had the bouncy castle the previous year in 2016, which we manned, together with our jumble sale store. In 2017, we decided to try out combining Bouncy Castle with the Universal Arcade carnival games, rather than jumble sale. We wanted to still run a bouncy castle as it was a huge draw for the kids - they loved it!
St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017 - Bouncy Castle 
We quickly realised that our teens were all still kids at heart - they wanted to play too! So for the safety of our customers, we decided to split the sessions to segregate the jumpers by age. This way, we have jump sessions for younger kids, and sessions for teens. Thus, we ensure that our toddlers and young kids would not be in danger of being trampled on by the rowdy teens!

Our Sub-Committee in charge of the bouncy castle also planned ahead of time, for cleaning of the bouncy castle in between every few sessions of use. We stand by buckets of clean water and rags, to give the bouncy castle floor a wipe down every hour or so. All of us parents are all too aware of how dirty a bouncy castle can get with all the kids and teens getting more and more sweaty with every jump - thank goodness the hall is air-conditioned!

Come, let's go on a tour of our Universal Arcade games! Our awesome Children's Liturgy Team worked together to beautify the carnival games I made - which on hindsight, looked skeletal and drab in appearance. The people you see in the pictures are mainly our Children's Liturgy Team members tending to the game stalls. Yes, the kids too! We have our kids help out as well for they are useful members of our team and it takes a lot to tire them out :) So we adults are mighty glad of the help they could provide during this busy weekend.
St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017 - Villain Busters and Mini Mayhem
In Mini Mayhem, throw the hoops to loop the yellow monsters to earn stamps! It's that easy! My children hand drew the pictures of them and coloured them meticulously before I had them laminated. The laminated pictures are tied around a 1.25 litre soft drink bottle which we half filled with water to weigh it down.

In Villain Busters, players would be handed some squishy toy animal, and they throw it at the pictures of the villains! The pictures are actually flaps which will move back and let the item through when it is being hit! This game was made by the good people at Paper Carpenter.
St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017 - Flush It! 
One of our most popular games is Flush It! Just throw the toilet rolls into the toilet bowls! The top picture was posed for - the toilet bowls certainly don't stink!?!?! The toilet bowl covers were kindly loaned to us from Sinbor Company, and have never been used before, only for display. We simply attached it to cardboard boxes which we wrapped up nicely in fancy, snazzy wrapping paper! People simply loved this game coz it looks so cute! :) 

When we were planning our games for Universal Arcade, someone in our team saw a picture of such a carnival game online, and suggested we make a similar one. So we asked in our group whatsapp chat:"Does anyone have any spare toilet seat covers in their storeroom that we can use to make this game?" To our surprise, Edyll replied almost immediately, saying that the company she works for would be able to sponsor us the toilet bowl covers. We were astounded! Ask and you shall be given, says the Lord! :)

St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017 - Poke Kart
Another game which drew many onlookers was Poke Kart. Themed after the Poke Go game, players control a remote control car to certain checkpoints indicated on the track. Reach more checkpoints, score more stamps! The Poke theme is a little passe by now, so we're likely to re-theme this game into a Formula D racing car game.

Most of the walls of our Poke Kart track are actually bed slats which we found at the void deck. It wasn't ideal as the slats couldn't stand properly and we had to tape them to the floor. The shorter walls are made of thick cardboard protectors that came in some of the cartons of board games that I import to sell online. These weren't ideal as well, since they were relatively lightweight and would move when a car ran into it. We had to tape these to the floor too.

Now, once again, God provides! Just as we were thinking about how we were going to obtain suitable pieces of wood for us to construct a new race track for Universal Arcade 2018, we came across an opportunity for us to obtain such wood for almost free! Thus, thanks to an awesome stock of wood we got from Triple Eyelid Studio which they sold for very reasonable rates, we're working on constructing the new game track right now! So come visit our Universal Arcade 2018 to see the new track and play our games!
St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017 - Nerf Wars
What's an arcade without some shooting games, eh?! Well, we have two! In Nerf Wars - we use original Nerf Guns, of course. Shoot the figureheads of the dark villain and his soldiers to earn stamps . The figureheads were actually from a Christmas party bag that used to contain candy within. I saved the little containers coz I thought they looked so cute, and now they've come in handy!

In Howdy's Shootin' Range, you use Rubber Band Guns to shoot a target. Our home made target shooting range was made from cardboard, and Yakult bottles. Hit the targets to earn stamps. We generally don't promote violence, but a little shooting practice is good fun! Look, even a granny, and Fr Justin gave it a shot - pun intended! :) The shooting games were naturally a hit with boys of all ages! What's with boys and guns?!
St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017 - Howdy's Shootin' Gallery
Do you remember the flicking games Asher and Shawna helped me with? The twins loved the games they made so much, they asked if we can make a new one to use for the funfair, instead of using theirs! We made a new one which was bigger, and it got re-themed into "Feed the Ants". Flick the bottle caps onto the holes with ants' pictures on them to 'feed' them and earn stamps. Made entirely of card board and beautified by some good painting skills!

"Poo and His Honey Brunch" was a spur of the moment invention, using a mini catapult to bounce little bears onto the board in search of honey. Land the bears on honey spots to earn stamps! Once again, cardboard is our friend! So is Google :)
St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017 - Feed the Ants game, and  Poo and His Honey Brunch game
Eggs Run was inspired by an Easter Week activity that I helped helm at my kids' primary school the previous Easter. Easy enough to play, throw the eggs onto the egg trays and aim for the coloured spaces! Our Team gamely ate many eggs and collected many egg carton trays for us to paint and use in this game. No chicks were harmed in the making and playing of this game - they are plastic eggs! :)
St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017 - Eggs Run
You would have probably realised by now, our Universal Arcade games are very easy to play, but not necessarily easy to score - you need a bit of skill in most of them! This makes it fun and challenging for our players! You have to come experience them for yourselves! Like this game below, we have Park Your Car! Players need to send their car into the garage. Park your cars and earn your stamps! The facade of the garage buildings is a scrap collage project by Pauleen made of cardboard and coloured paper! Awesomesauce!
St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017 - Park Your Car
Another perennial favourite of ours are the hand mazes that are made entirely out of cardboard! I made the ones in cardboard brown, and the other two were done by Francis & Renne - what a stroke of genius to have a background image! Inspired by You Know What, players have to navigate the mazes to get to various checkpoints, in the shortest time possible. We have four mazes in all, two are simpler than the other two. So depending on your age, you get a different one. You're welcome to come try them all! Many people do! They are that fun!
St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017 - Handy Mazes
Last but not least, we have the Shield of Faith! Good Ol' Capt can throw his shields with unwavering accuracy so he must have put in many hours training his throw at a training facility like the one we have set up here! Throw the small shields into any of the rectangle holes, and earn your stamps! The small flying saucer shields are made up of some corn ware disposable plates that Ivy and I taped together with duct tape. We made sure they were decorated like Capt's shields. The banner is hubbs' expedition banner from the year before that was headed for the bin. I rescued it and it came in handy when we made this game. This time, it was Ivy who gave it an aesthetical facelift by taping up the holes in different colours and added the pictures of the shields.

We strongly believe in Reduce, Reuse, Re-purpose, Recycle. You can see that most of our games are made from cardboard boxes we have re-purposed. We reuse and re-purposed many things such as cardboard, plastic bottles, bottle caps, and wood. We're a green bunch, right here! We're learning and trying our best to be as green as we can be - to show God how we can be good stewards of His creation!
St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017 - Shield of Faith
You must be wondering what is this "earn your stamps" that we keep mentioning? Well, what are games without prizes to be won, right? So we have a huge Prize Redemption Booth full of prizes to be won! The bottom left hand corner of the collage below shows a St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017 Game Card which you purchase with your coupons.

Each Game Card gives you an entitlement of playing three different games - yes, any three different games of all the games listed above - not including Bouncy Castle. You need to buy a Bouncy Castle Ticket to have a go inside the Bouncy Castle. So after getting your Game Card, you look for a game which you wish to play. Wait for your turn, and hand the Game Card to the people manning the game booth. For each game, you will definitely get one stamp - for participation. Then, you can earn up to three more stamps per game you play.  You will be awarded stamps accordingly, depending on how well you play the game you have selected. Thus, in one Game Card, you will get a minimum of 3 stamps, and a maximum of 12 stamps.
St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017 - Game Card & Prize Redemption Booth
You may come to the Prize Redemption Booth at any time to check out the prizes still available for redemption. They will have a Stamp Value marked on them. So for example, the huge Transformers below needed a total of 200 stamps to have it redeemed. The collage below shows some of our biggest winners in 2017, look at their grins!

But worry not, there is something for everyone! We have small prizes available for redemption for as few as 3 stamps. So even if you only buy one Game Card and don't play the games well, you'd still be able to get a small trinket, at least! However, that hardly happened at all! Our Universal Arcade games are such good and wholesome fun, that many families came and had so much fun! We overheard people saying that "THIS IS WHERE THE REAL FUN IS!"
St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017 - Nestle Breakfast Cereals, Singapore
Not only do we have good fun, we have good value food too! Nestle Breakfast Cereals was so kind to send us cartons of cereal that have a few more months to their Best Before Date. They are simply awesome greensome to do that! Did you know that as estimated $200 million of worth of food are discarded in Singapore annually? Well, we're happy to say that Nestle Breakfast Cereals try their best not to contribute to that figure! We were all fairly familiar with Cheerios, but many of us were introduced to the Nestle Fitnesse range of cereals for the first time. Apparently, they contain over 40% wholegrain nutrition, essential vitamins and minerals including folic acid and dietary fibre. These healthy cereals were a big hit! Thank you, Nestle Breakfast Cereals!
St Mary's Universal Arcade 2017 - Grand Prize Winners!
Our Children's Liturgy Team had put so much effort, time and energy into making and sprucing up these games, sorting of prizes, worrying over logistical issues, manpower scheduling, marketing efforts and photography - all good photos in this post by Brian Ng :) As such, we were all ecstatic to see how well the Universal Arcade games were received. It gave us joy, and hope too, to see so many kids and adults alike, having fun with good ol' fashioned carnival games - with no electronic gadget in sight! Many a kind parishioner praised and thanked us for running these games, as they had enjoyed themselves thoroughly.

So, if you have enjoyed reading about the games above, you MUST come and experience most of them at our Universal Arcade 2018! In fact, it'd be most of these games, and more! We're planning and making them now, as you read this post! The main St Mary's Feast Day Funfair (tonnes of delicious food and other game stalls run by other parishioners) would be on Sunday 5th August 2018 from 8am to 3pm. However, Universal Arcade is also open on Saturday 4th August 2018 from 5.30pm - 8.30pm! So if you wish to beat the crowd and yet check out Universal Arcade - come on Saturday evening!

Church of St Mary of the Angels Feast Day 2018
Last but not least, in addition to our awesome Team, we had loads of help from our own personal friends and family, as well as parents of the children attending Children's Liturgy at St Mary's! They helped stock our Prize Redemption Booth! Not a single prize was bought by us! The prizes were all crowd-sourced from family, friends, parishioners and friends of friends. Our Universal Arcade would not have been the roaring success it was without the contribution of the awesome prizes we received. 

We believe, and we know, that many of us in Singapore are a privileged bunch of people that actually have a surplus of many brand new things that we still keep holed up in our cupboards and bomb shelter. These may include toys, games, bags, household appliances. Bring them out and donate them to us to use as prizes for our Prize Redemption Booth! We welcome used items as well, if they are in excellent, working condition. 

NOW is the time to declutter and send your good stuff our way! Small items such as stationery sets, small toys, and books, are also welcomed, but we are sorely lacking in big prizes that our big winners happily carted home last year. So now we need more! 

If you're in the West, drop off your items at the St Clare Hall at Level 2 of the Church of St Mary of the Angels at 5 Bukit Batok East Ave 2, Singapore 659918 - every Saturday in July from 3 - 4pm. If you know of any friend attending our church, pass it to them and ask them to drop off the stuff for you! :p Alternatively, whatsapp 94301421 - and we'd see if we can arrange something. 

Let the miracle of Five Loaves and Two Fishes, 2018 edition, begin!

Saturday 19 August 2017

Bring Your Kids to Work Day!

Before I became a mumpreneur, the corporate company I used to work for had an annual Bring Your Kids to Work Day. It was kind of a misnomer as you usually hardly get any work done that day. I think it was more for the kids to come see your work place. The company was also nice about it, organising fun stuff for the kids, like a magic show or some crafting activity. Most people end up bringing their young kids - you hardly see older kids like those in primary/secondary schools. But I guess that was to be expected since those kids were probably all in school!
 
So it came to be that yesterday was the first time in the history of My First Games that we had a Bring Your Kids to Work Day! But this time round, I did expect them to do real work for me, as in, seriously help me out with what I was doing. Now, before you start your complain email to the Ministry of Manpower about me using child labour, let me tell you why the kids weren't in school yesterday morning... It was the PSLE oral examinations day! The younger kids didn't have to go to school on Thursday and Friday. And since I'd already agreed to go to a secondary school to sell games, I decided to bring them with me... to work!
Bring Your Kids to Work Day 2017
In my line of work, running an online shop, I would usually accept any invitations to go to schools or workplaces to sell games, if it doesn't clash with anything on my schedule. These would usually be weekday morning/lunchtime affairs, which would wrap up at say 1plus pm. Then I would quickly pack up my wares to get on with my other full time job - picking the kids from school and being with them. So it's usually a busy morning for me to have to display and sell my wares, and the rush to have to pack up stuff to be in time to fetch the kids from school. So I was rather glad that this time round, the date clashed with the PSLE Oral days, which meant that I didn't have to rush off to fetch the kids. In addition, I now had additional three pairs of hands to help me with carrying stuff and setting up the booth. More importantly, I had three more pairs of mouths to help me teach customers-to-be how to play the games we loved and sold.
 
The kids were very pleased and excited to be coming with me to work. They were pretty hyped up about it and enthusiastically went about arranging the tables, lay out the table cloth, display the games and set up the cards in preparation for when customers would arrive - and they would teach customers how to play.
 
There were a few other stalls present, mostly selling food like honey vinegar and snacks, loads of snacks like rice crackers, chocolate and potato chips. We were the only non-food stall present selling stuff. Situated right outside the staff room door, we were supposed to sell to the school's teachers who would come by to see our wares in between their lessons.
 
We were there for slightly over 4 hours. And I would say it was an average sales day. It wasn't totally bad for there were sales, but it wasn't exactly excellent either - I'd done better at some other schools. What I found interesting was the children's reaction to their day at work with me. So I had a mini interview with each of them this morning to find out their thoughts...
 
Question: What did you think about your day yesterday, selling games with me? 
 
Asher: "It is tiring and not fun at all. I thought it would be fun and that many people will come to our stall (but that was not the case)."
 
Shawna: "It wasn't fun at all.  I thought it would be like that time when I went with you to your secondary school to sell bears.  People came. I think next time just bring a lot of snacks to sell. "
 
Isaac: "I think it was a bit boring because not a lot of people came to our stall so we can't show them how to play the games. But it was also quite fun because I could play Gobblet Gobblers with a lot of the teachers as they found the game very cute. "
 
As you can tell, our stall wasn't very happening at all. Not many people showed interest in our games. So even though I had three additional headcount ready to explain the games, and play them with customers... people weren't interested to begin with! And yes, the kids all noticed that the snack store had a lot more interest and business instead!
 
Isaac: "I'm surprised the snack store did so well because I don't  really like snacks so I didn't expect other people to like snacks so much. I am also not surprised though, because a lot of people in my school also likes the snack store and they buy from them a lot. " 
 
Honestly, even I was tempted by the wares of the snack stall! They sold a mind-boggling array of Japanese and Taiwanese snacks, and did exceedingly well. I was mighty pleased that my children weren't interested in the least! The boys didn't bother to even look at the food up close, and even though I saw Shawna going by to have a closer look, she wasn't interested in anything enough to ask me to buy. I am proud to say I resisted the temptation to get any snacks too!
 
Question: What were your expectations like? How did you think it was going to be, selling games with me? 
 
Isaac: "I expected that a lot of people would come and we would be busy teaching people how to play and playing the games with them."
 
From what Asher and Shawna said above, I could see that they had the same expectation as Isaac. They were looking forward to a busy morning explaining games to people. I would say this is the Optimistic Outlook of Entrepreneurs! And so I did explain to them, that things may not always work out the way we expect them to be.
 
Asher and Shawna grew distracted from their task - as there were not many customers to entertain. They went off to play on the school swing they spotted on their way to the toilets, and left Isaac and me to fend for ourselves. So when there were teachers who were excited about one of our bestsellers Gobblet Gobblers and kept wanting to play the demo set we laid out - Isaac was very happy to indulge them in multiple games, especially when the teachers realised that Isaac played the game well and he was the one to beat!
 
Question: Why do you think not many people came to our stall?
 
Shawna: "Because they don't have time to play games as they need to do their homework ."

Isaac: "I think because a lot of the teachers here don't have children. I also think that the snack store attracted a lot of attention and made them spend all their money. "
 
Asher: "Because they don't have kids or their kids don't play games. Or they think games are not fun so they don't play games.  That is so sad." 
 
Isaac was admonishing me on bringing only two copies of Go Away Monster because they were sold and another customer wanted another copy. We also sold all three copies of Sushi Go we brought because one of the staff already had the game and had introduced it to his colleagues prior to us coming by yesterday. So I explained to him how we could only being a few copies of every game if we wanted to bring a large selection of games. And how it was impossible to predict exactly what would sell well and what wouldn't.
 
Well, all things considered, I think the kids have got a pretty good read on the situation.  I think it was an excellent experience for them, being on the job with me.  I told the three of them "This is what Mummy does on some days, when you're in school. I go to places to set up stalls to sell games. It isn't always very fun, though it is almost always very tiring! And there isn't always a swing to sit on, nor friends who treat us to ice-cream and cold drinks."
 
Special thanks to my primary school classmate WC, for the drinks and ice-cream, and multiple games of Gobblet Gobblers with Isaac. You singlehandedly brightened up our day! :)
Mdm HWC's photo! :)

Wednesday 20 July 2016

Auntie Pam's Carnival Games

I've always loved to play games. Any kind of games. Board games, carnival games, yard games. All sorts of games. I've also always loved to make stuff. Especially making stuff out of other stuff - reusing and recycling things. But the trigger was Isaac, really. It'd been happening one too many time, when we were at a funfair or a carnival where there are game stalls, and we would only be willing to buy the family at most $10 worth of tickets and had to ration that between the three kids for them to "play stuff" at the funfair. As you probably know, $10 doesn't get you very far. You could, possibly, at best, play 5 games at $2 a pop. Or more likely only 3 times if each game costs $3. Even $20, or $30, or $50 would honestly be insufficient to sate the appetite of the young ones seeking to play their fill at a funfair. 

We had this conversation once, when Isaac begged us to get more tickets so he could have another try at the game booths. You know, the ones where you invariably get three balls to throw at some target, or three shots with a toy gun, or something like that. 

Isaac:"Please Mummy... one more try..."
Mummy:" Why do you want to play the game?"
Isaac:"Er... because I want to get a prize?"
Mummy:"What prize? Those small toy thingies? Do you really want that?"
Isaac:"No... not really... erm... I just want to play... looks fun..."
Mummy:"You pay $2 and get three tries to throw a ball to try to hit something. If you want to play, I can make many games like that for you and you can play all you like. Without paying a single cent."

In the end we convinced him and the twins to go line up for the Zorb ball experience. Even though it was $5 per head, we convinced them that they would have more fun at trying something like that, than throwing three balls. 

Another time, we gave him some tickets and allowed him to use it any way he wished. He went off, played some carnival games and came back. We asked him if it was worth it, and he agreed and said he now understood what we meant. It also helped that being in primary three now, he has at least two years plus experience of using money. This has helped him have an inkling of the value of money. He realizes that spending his entire daily allowance of $2 to throw three balls, wasn't really worth it. 

I felt bad denying him the fun of playing funfair games though. This innate sense of the need to want to let him have such fun thus provided the impetus that pushed me into action. To turn the thoughts and plans in my head, into real physical things. I started making simple carnival games. 
I wanted to make games out of everyday items we have lying around the house, stuff we would normally throw out. Also, I needed them to be easy to keep, so they had to have a small footprint, or be able to be dismantled. And this was what I came up with in The First Batch of games.

First Batch of Auntie Pam's DIY Funfair Games - Clockwise From Top Left: Shoot for Gold, Ring the Target, Bin It, Basketball, and the standees for Target Practice
Shoot For Gold - I cut plastic milk cartons, shampoo bottles and body soap bottles in half to fill the cardboard box. Players get three or five bottle caps and aim to throw them into the golden coloured bottles. Bottle caps are used instead of balls, so that the game master doesn't have to run after balls. 

Ring the Target - These are just CD spindles, which I duct-taped to make it look brighter. The mini hoops are the luminous light sticks that kids like to wear around their wrists. They don't shine anymore, but that's okay - we just need them as hoops. Players have to aim for the spines and loop the spine! 

Bin It - These bins are the covers of the CD spindles whose spines/bottoms  I used for Ring the Target. I previously used juggling balls (which were not fully round) to throw, but that made the game too difficult as the diameter of the 'ball' was slightly greater than half the diameter of the plastic bin - making it quite a challenging task. Now, we use a set of five-stones. It's like throwing something into the bin, aim for a bin and Bin It! 

Basketball - I added two more hoops (empty duct tape rolls) attached to the box with cable ties.  This one is fairly obvious too eh? Throw the ball into any of the three hoops! This game sits in the box itself, so that the game master for this game would not have to run about picking balls - the balls should drop right into the box itself, making it easy for retrieval.

Target Practice - I had the kidzes help colour in the bad guys in the colouring books we had at home. Cut them out, and pasted them on cardboard. Using scraps of cardboard and making slits in them, these formed the stands for the baddies on cardboard. I had a whole booklet of Thomas & Friends stickers that had lost its stickiness, and so I decided to just glue these on cardboard as well. Tah dah! Target standees for our highly popular shooting game Target Practice! Every time we use them, we make use of whatever chairs or furniture we have available to form the shooting range. The extensiveness of the shooting range would depend on how innovative and creative the Game Master and his assistants are for that day. Just look at the variety below!
Target Practice - Everyone loves the shooting games at a funfair and ours is no exception! The line of kids that forms to play this game is usually the longest!
So, what fun is games without prizes eh? Don't worry, we've got that covered too. I figured we all have loads of stuff at home, right? New stuff, as well as used stuff. One man's trash is another's treasure. And kids always find other children's toys more fun anyway. So we pre-empt all the parents, and ask that they bring stuff from home. Stationery, toys, books, bags, stuff - new or used is fine, as long as the used items are in good condition. And boy did everyone rise to the occasion! Most mums are simply glad to have this opportunity to declutter their homes and bring stuff to donate to the Prize Redemption Booth. We also encourage the kids to give away toys which they no longer play with. It was a great success, just look at our Prize Redemption Booth pix below - filled to the brim with loads of awesome stuff. 

At each carnival game session, we need the parents to volunteer to be Game Masters for each game. Each Game Master would be provided with a "chop" - an inked stamp. Kids would be given sheets of paper. Each time they play a game, depending on how well they fared at the game, they would be awarded chops/stamps by Game Master on their pieces of paper. Collect many chops, then proceed to the Prize Redemption Booth to use your chops to redeem prizes =) 

It was a hit. The kids loved earning the chops, and they loved spending them too. We routinely ask the kidzes if they enjoyed an event we have just been to or an activity we had just done, and why they think so. We do this as we want to understand what they are thinking. For the carnival game sessions, Shawna specifically highlights that she enjoys spending her stamps "shopping for prizes". The boys heartily agree, and we do notice Isaac often spending his chops redeeming items meant for giving to the twins. In fact, we see other kids doing that too - redeeming items for their siblings. Most heartwarming :) 
Play Auntie Pam's Carnival Games, earn stamps, and spend them redeeming your prizes at the Prize Redemption Booth!
My DIY homemade carnival/funfair games was a such a huge hit that our friends started calling me Auntie Ringo - after the once ubiquitous Uncle Ringo professional funfair operator. It was high praise, and I was most pleased. It also inspired me to make more games.

I made the Mazes. Made entirely out of cardboard, white glue, some imagination and lots of estimation. The first maze is the one on the right below, the Three Little Pigs Maze. Players are timed to see how long they take to complete the route. A marble is placed at the Start, you use your hands to tilt the board and guide the marble - the Wolf - to the 1st little pig's home, 2nd pig's home, 3rd pig's home, before going to End to complete the route.

The mazes reminded me of  the Triwizard Tournament Maze in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. And being the huge Harry Potter fans we all are - the next maze is the Harry Potter themed maze! After having the experience of making the Three Little Pigs Maze, I now understood how I can make the maze more difficult to navigate. Thus I set about making a more challenging maze.

In the Harry Potter maze (below, Right), you are Harry Potter (it's a yellow & red marble!), and you begin the race at Start. You have to get to the numbered checkpoints, the last being Checkpoint 7. The checkpoint drawings are illustrated by Artist Asher, as follows:
Checkpoint 1 - Sphinx
Checkpoint 2 - Dementor
Checkpoint 3 - Acromantula (Spider)
Checkpoint 4 - Blast-Ended Skrewt
Checkpoint 5 - TriWizard Cup
Checkpoint 6 - Cemetery
Checkpoint 7 - Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry

It was a pity we did't think to check that the checkpoints monsters were not met by Harry in the same order as they were in the book, but well... I loved the illustrations done by Asher, and I wanted to keep them.
Auntie Pam's DIY cardboard mazes - Harry Potter Maze and Three Little Pigs Maze
The success of our new game - the mazes - inspired the kidzes to invent games too. Thus we started to brainstorm about other carnival games we could make. I was telling them that we had a lot of Throwing games, we had a Shooting game, the mazes were a sort of "Rolling" game... what were we short of? A flicking game, I said! 

The twins caught on, and we started to discuss and brainstorm about the mechanisms and themes their games could take. I challenged Isaac to think of a different game as well. I didn't want to end up with three similar flicking games. Inspired by the real funfair his school had recently, Isaac had the idea to build a small version of a dunking machine.

I had the kidzes draw out on paper their construction plans for their games. One must always have a plan. So it was that we began the long, arduous process of designing and constructing a game. The twins drew the circles, but it was hubbs and I who used the penknife to cut out the circles. They helped with the gluing and made the decisions regarding the theme. Asher and Shawna were completely in charge of the aesthetics of the game though - a truly excellent job they did with that. Much, much better than anything I or the hubbs could have come up with. 
Do-It-Yourself! Make Your Own Carnival/Funfair Games today!!!
We spend the whole of Sunday afternoon doing this, but the kids enjoyed it tremendously, and want to do it again! Read on to learn more about their good work done!

Go Home Kids! by Shawna Tan
The kids are three small balls, who need to get past fast flowing streams and volcanic lava pits to head to the three dark blue holes which are the entrances to the secret underground tunnels which will get them home! (She rejected my theme suggestion of Moles). The marbles have to be placed on the small square depression in the middle of the Start Panel - as Shawna is adamant that you can only flick with fingers on one hand - you cannot use your other hand to hold the marble. The game is trickier than it seems because there is a "drain" depression right at the back of the board, trapping balls and preventing them from bouncing off the back wall into the blue holes. Shawna decides that players who manage to send the kids home will get 3 chops or 5 chops. Generous!

Ant Trap by Asher Tan
Players flick bottle caps and try to enter them into the holes with numbers in them. The numbers indicate the chops you would receive if you manage to flick your bottle cap into those holes. Here, you flick bottle caps which have more friction, and are less forgiving than balls which will roll and possible get somewhere by luck. Players would likely get a minimum result of at least one chop, but the three chops slot is the smallest and is quite tricky to get into. Love the ant hill scenery backdrop, ants and anteaters that Asher has drawn and painted!

Down with Goliath! by Isaac Tan
This is a toy soldier scaled dunking machine!!! The toy soldier is Goliath, and players play the role of David, who uses stones (five stones! ;p) to hit the target, which swings back, causing the other end to swing forward and topple Goliath into the Acid Moat below! This entire contraption was conceived by Isaac. And he did all the decorations himself too.
Carnival Games by the Tan Family Kidzes! Down with Goliath by Isaac. Go Home Kids by Shawna. Ant Trap by Asher. 
The kids can't wait for there to be another Carnival Games Session so that others can get to play their games. Already, they are dreaming of the queues that would form to play their games, and Shawna even asked me if she could choose the adult Game Master to be in charge of her game. The kidzes are already clamouring for another Game-Making session. As Isaac puts it "Building games is painfully slow, but the outcomes are magical!" And what magic the kidzes have done! Beautiful!

So have I inspired you to Make-Your-Own Carnival Games?! :) Try it, it's fun! The kids get to exercise their imagination and hone their STEM skills, and we adults get an exercise in self-control where we have to control ourselves to NOT tell the kids what we think is the "correct" answer and solution to everything - let them think through it themselves! You'd be amazed with what they can do!

So have I convinced you to let your kids make a little mess at home in the process to making something? If I haven't, watch this video on Caine's Arcade! It was what inspired me as well and started me thinking and forming ideas in my head! I love how innovative Caine is and how his story spawned a whole movement - The Imagination Foundation and the Cardboard Challenge! Really awesome stuff.

One challenge I had was that, unlike Caine, I didn't have a whole garage to store the games in. Neither did I want to throw away our hard work and have to remake them every time we wanted to use them.  So I needed to make sure that the games could be kept neatly and stored for repeated use. So I figured that they had to fit into certain cardboard boxes that I had. And so it is, that all the games you saw above, are all stored in the 6 boxes in the pix below.

Tan Family Carnival Games - all kept and ready for the next session!
So get on it and make your own carnival games today! Check out our other Make-Your-Own series posts below!

MAKE YOUR OWN TOYS TODAY!

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