This late summer Saturday I got the urge to look into one path of the historical evolution of the activity Moonball - one of my top 10 favorites, and most often used, team building activities I know. To limit my quest (and the length of this post) I chose to stay with three Karl Rohnke books from my shelf.
Moonball 1984 (Silver Bullets, 1984, 1st edition)
Scatter your group around an open playing area. Use a "well inflated" beach ball as the object of play. The group's objective is to hit the ball aloft as many times as possible before the ball strikes the ground.
Rules:
1) A player cannot hit the ball twice in succession.
2) Count one point for each hit.
That was it! Go for as many points possible before the ball hits the ground. Then, the group attempts to beat their established best score. Continue play as long as the motivation holds out.
Moonball 1988 (The Bottomless Bag, 1988)
In this book Karl adds to the basic rules (above):
3) Two points are allowed for a kick.
He then goes on to share a few variations. After a couple rounds of basic play (with Rule 3 added), ask the group to see how many times they can hit the ball in sequence (each player only hitting once) through all the players without letting the ball hit the ground, or missing a player (e.g., someone else touches the ball again).
How about this one: See how fast (timing attempts) the ball can travel from player to player in sequence (each player hitting the ball once), through the whole group. Karl notes that the ball must be hit and not simply passed.
Finally, this one: Playing a basic Moonball game (Moonball 1984) record the most number of points (hits) during a two minute time limit (players can hit the ball more than once during the game). This time, the stopwatch continues to run even when the ball strikes the ground. So the group must return the ball back into hit mode – someone needs to serve the ball back into the air (that service hit is a point). Play a few two-minute games attempting to beat the current best score.
These are ways to keep the group engaged in Moonball when motivation diminishes with one version. Talk about the value of 'change.'
Moonball Space Warp (Bottomless Baggie, 1991. Variation shared by Steve Butler.)
For a group of 15-20 people use a 20" beach ball and two or three hula hoops. The objective in this variation is to score as many beach ball strikes, for points, as possible before the ball strikes the ground.
Here are the rules:
Steve's main point of interest about adding the hoops is related to learning how to use a "new" piece of equipment and the group dynamics that surround this process. You're playing basic Moonball and then something new is added. How does the group manage this change? How do they manage the transition from one way of doing something to another?
More Moonball variations? (Check out the current comments below.) And, please share more ideas for this classic team builder in the Comments.
All the best,
Chris Cavert, Ed.D.
(updated 3/26/25)
Moonball 1984 (Silver Bullets, 1984, 1st edition)
Scatter your group around an open playing area. Use a "well inflated" beach ball as the object of play. The group's objective is to hit the ball aloft as many times as possible before the ball strikes the ground.
Rules:
1) A player cannot hit the ball twice in succession.
2) Count one point for each hit.
That was it! Go for as many points possible before the ball hits the ground. Then, the group attempts to beat their established best score. Continue play as long as the motivation holds out.
Moonball 1988 (The Bottomless Bag, 1988)
In this book Karl adds to the basic rules (above):
3) Two points are allowed for a kick.
He then goes on to share a few variations. After a couple rounds of basic play (with Rule 3 added), ask the group to see how many times they can hit the ball in sequence (each player only hitting once) through all the players without letting the ball hit the ground, or missing a player (e.g., someone else touches the ball again).
How about this one: See how fast (timing attempts) the ball can travel from player to player in sequence (each player hitting the ball once), through the whole group. Karl notes that the ball must be hit and not simply passed.
Finally, this one: Playing a basic Moonball game (Moonball 1984) record the most number of points (hits) during a two minute time limit (players can hit the ball more than once during the game). This time, the stopwatch continues to run even when the ball strikes the ground. So the group must return the ball back into hit mode – someone needs to serve the ball back into the air (that service hit is a point). Play a few two-minute games attempting to beat the current best score.
These are ways to keep the group engaged in Moonball when motivation diminishes with one version. Talk about the value of 'change.'
Moonball Space Warp (Bottomless Baggie, 1991. Variation shared by Steve Butler.)
For a group of 15-20 people use a 20" beach ball and two or three hula hoops. The objective in this variation is to score as many beach ball strikes, for points, as possible before the ball strikes the ground.
Here are the rules:
- One point for each hand strike.
- Two points for each foot strike.
- The points for a hand or foot strike are doubled if the beach ball goes through a hoop after a strike.
- The beach ball can only go through a hoop in one direction - it cannot be struck back and forth through the hoop.
- After the beach ball travels through a hoop, the hoop must be given to another player before the beach ball can travel through this particular hoop.
- Hoops cannot touch one another.
- A beach ball cannot travel through more than one hoop after a strike.
- When the beach ball hits the ground that particular game is over - record the score and continue with another game if the group is up for beating their current record.
Steve's main point of interest about adding the hoops is related to learning how to use a "new" piece of equipment and the group dynamics that surround this process. You're playing basic Moonball and then something new is added. How does the group manage this change? How do they manage the transition from one way of doing something to another?
More Moonball variations? (Check out the current comments below.) And, please share more ideas for this classic team builder in the Comments.
All the best,
Chris Cavert, Ed.D.
(updated 3/26/25)
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