Creating Classroom Community with Paper Football

I am working with 6th grade this year and I've been focusing on how to create a welcoming and safe environment for my students. The great thing about middle school is that you get to start over every quarter with a new group. This quarter I chose to create a friendly competition for the group.  One thing I've learned teaching kids is if you liked it when you were "that age"... "that age" still loves it.  Weaving in early education, friendship bracelets in intermediate... and so on.  In middle school, I loved to make these paper footballs for all my friends.  My husband loved to play the game and he lived hundreds of miles away from me. This might have been a 'thing' worldwide... If they are bringing back Starwars, Zuba pants, and silly putty... I can bring back paper footballs. 

Here is a video I made on how to create a paper football. 

I went to a Free Bracket Generator online and created a single elimination bracket for the group. When I do this again, I think I would do a round robin. Round robin means that each game you play another partner.  That way all students would be playing the whole tournament. 

Above is a look at my classroom in action. I also give the rules for the game (or at least my version). I would suggest this for any group that you are trying to create a classroom culture with. It was very successful in my Art Studio. 

The Rules of the game: 

• Slide the paper football back and forth between players
• The goal is to get the paper football to hang off from the edge of the opposite side (without falling off)
• If football hangs off the edge, it is worth 6 pts. for a touchdown. 
• Then the player who made the touchdown has the opportunity for an additional 1 pt. with a kickoff. 
• If the football falls off the edge of the table the opponent gets to kick a field goal for 3 pts. 
• We will play the game for 4 minutes per bracket level.