Tic Tac Toe – Three Wagons in a Row: Pioneer Game

Preparation

• Print nine wagons onto white cardstock. Cut out and put together the wagons with tape or glue. (I used double-sided tape so I can take them apart and store then in a file when not in use.) Cut three long pieces of string or twine and put three wagons on each string (see picture). Tie the ends of the string in knots or loops.
• Cut out nine 10X10 inch squares of fabric or brown lunch sack paper. Each of these squares will be made into a bag. I plan on putting song titles in some of my bags. Pioneer story titles, treats, game or activity items could also be put in the bags. Choose what to put in the bag and put one in the middle of each cut out square. Draw up the sides of each square into a sachet type bag. Tie each bag with twine or string. Put one bag in each wagon.
• Draw a large tic tac toe game board on the chalkboard. Put each string of wagons across a row. (Our chalk board has bulletin boards on each side so I plan on using tacks to attach the strings to each side of the board. Duck tape might also work on the edge of the board.) Make sure there is enough room for the wagons to be pushed off the tic tac toe board on each side. Start with the wagons all on the left side of the board (off the tic tac toe board).
• Print a dice and write the numbers one, two, or three on each of the spaces, or put two sets of each of these numbers in a bag.

Game Rules: Have a child roll the dice (or draw out numbers from a bag). The child moves one of the wagons the rolled amount of spaces across the tic tac toe board. Another child rolls the dice and does the same thing. The object of the game is to get three wagons  in a row, diagonally, horizontally, or vertically. This is not a competition. There are no teams. Let each Primary child take a turn rolling the dice and moving a wagon.

When one of the children gets three wagons in a row they get to choose one of the wagons and get its bag out. Whatever is inside the bag is the activity the Primary children will do, such as singing a pioneer song, or listening to a pioneer story, or doing a pioneer game or activity. After the activity, have the children continue playing the game in the same manner until all the bag activities have been done (or until time runs out).

(When there are no spaces where they can move a wagon, they must choose one of the wagons to slide off the game board to the right as their turn. When all three wagons on a string are on the right side of the board, they can start moving them back across to the left side of the board.)