Youth Workin' It

Consultancy and Resources for Youth Workers and Organizations Worldwide

Water Balloon Dodgeball – Youth Group Games

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Water Balloon Dodgeball
Image courtesy of Steve Wilhelm, Flickr

If you need a fun youth group game idea, why not try playing a twist on a youth group classic – Water Balloon Dodgeball.

Here’s how to play it:

Resources

  • Water balloons – at least 5 per young person
  • Buckets / large tubs
  • Cones / markers
  • Towels

Location

For this game you’ll need a fairly large open space outdoors, especially if you have a large youth group.

Due to all the running around and potential for youth falling over, it’s best if this is played on grass.

Preparation

  • Place a couple of cones at one end of the playing area and a couple of cones at the other end
  • Fill up all the water balloons and place in the buckets. Also fill the buckets with water to reduce the chance of the balloons bursting prematurely
  • Place the buckets in the middle of the playing area

Water Balloon Dodgeball Rules

  • All youth should stand at one end of the playing area behind the cones
  • When you say go, they have to run to the other end while you throw water balloons at them
  • If they get hit by a balloon before reaching the other end, they’re out
  • Once all remaining players are lined up the other side, say go and have them run back while you continue throwing water balloons at them

Winner

The last young person who’s managed to dodge being hit by a balloon.

Prize

Offer the ultimate prize for winning this version of dodgeball and allow the winner to throw the remaining water balloons at you (and your volunteers if they’re game!)

If you have enough balloons left over, you could instead play a leaders game of water balloon dodgeball, with the youth who won taking your place as the thrower.

Tip

For extremely large youth groups, you might need to have some of your volunteers help you with the throwing.

If you liked this idea, check out all our other youth group games, including many more that involve water.

Question: Can you think of any other ways you could play Water Balloon Dodgeball? We’d love to hear your ideas in the comments below.

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Water Balloon Toss – Youth Group Games

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Water Balloon Toss
Image courtesy of Tiswango, Flickr

The Water Balloon Toss is another of those great youth group games that gets young people completely soaking wet.

It can be played anywhere outdoors that’s large enough, but it’s a particularly good game for youth retreats where you’re likely to be in a wide open space and the youth will have a change of clothes on hand.

Here’s how to play Water Balloon Toss:

Resources

  • Water balloons
  • Bucket
  • Rope, duct tape or cones
  • Towels

Preparation

Fill up the water balloons and put them in a bucket of water to ensure that they don’t burst early. For this game, you’ll need one balloon for every two players, plus a few extras in case any do burst in the bucket.

At one end of the playing area, mark a line using the rope, duct tape, cones or whatever you have available to you. This isn’t essential, but can help ensure the young people don’t try to cheat.

Teams

Split the young people into pairs. Make sure you get all your volunteers involved as well – your youth will love to see them getting soaking wet too!

How To Play

The Water Balloon Toss works in exactly the same way as The Egg Toss:

  • Have one person from each pair stand behind the line that’s laid out on the ground
  • Their partner should stand about two yards away, with them both facing each other (see image below). They should also be about two yards away from the people to their left and right, providing there’s enough space
  • One person from each pair is given a water balloon
  • When the game starts, they have to toss the balloon to their partner who has to catch it without it bursting
  • If a balloon bursts, that pair is out of the game and should stand to the side
  • For the remaining players, the row of players that isn’t behind the line should take a step back
  • The side that has the balloon should then throw the balloon back
  • Continue the game with the one side taking a step back every time their pairing makes a successful catch

Water Balloon Toss Standing Positions

Winner

The winning pair is the one that manages to get the furthest from each other without their balloon bursting.

Additional Tips

  • Have someone count to three before the water balloons are tossed, so that all the players throw at the same time
  • Also have someone keeping an eye on the row of players that moves back to ensure that they’re all an equal distance away from their partners
  • This game can be over quickly, so prepare double the amount of water balloons if you want them to have another chance of playing
  • When there’s just one pair left, let them continue the Water Balloon Toss to see how far they manage to get from each other
  • Don’t miss out on the opportunity to take photos or video footage of this game. Make sure that you have photo release forms completed if you want to publish the photos anywhere (including Facebook)

If you liked this water balloon game, check out all of our other water games. We also have loads of other great games, so there’s no need to ever be short of fun youth group activities!

Question: Do you use any different rules for the Water Balloon Toss or add anything in to make it even more fun? We’d love to hear your ideas in the comments below.

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Water Balloon Relay – Youth Group Games

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Water Balloon RelayThis week’s addition to our collection of youth group games is a water balloon relay – fun to play, simple to organize and potentially very, very wet!

Here’s how to play the Water Balloon Relay:

Resources

  • Water balloons
  • Buckets
  • Markers of some kind (e.g. cones, chairs, duct tape, etc)
  • Towels

Preparation

  • Fill up all the water balloons and place them in the buckets (one bucket per team)
  • Put the buckets in a line at one end of the playing area – this will be the starting line
  • Place the markers in a parallel line about 10-20 yards away from the buckets (depending on how hard you want to make it!)
  • Split the youth group into same-sized teams

Rules

Have each team line up behind a bucket of water balloons. The first person from each team should put one of the balloons between their legs.

The challenge is for them to move to the other marker, go round it and then return back to the starting line. They can try to do this by jumping, shuffling, waddling, crawling or any other possible movement.

The only restrictions are that the water balloon must remain between their legs and they’re not allowed to use their hands to touch the balloon (other than when placing the balloon between their legs at the beginning).

As this is a relay, when they get back to the start line, the next person on their team does the same thing.

Options

Due to the nature of this youth group game, there’s a good chance that players will get very wet due to the balloons bursting while they’re in the race. If that happens, there are a few options you can choose to enforce:

1. One strike and you’re out!

If a player bursts their balloon, they’re out – the next player on their team then has their turn.

2. Three strikes and you’re out!

Similar to the first option, a player gets three opportunities to complete their leg of the relay race. If choosing this option, a player has to continue from where they burst their water balloon.

If choosing this option, try to have volunteers on hand to give them replacement balloons – that will help ensure they continue from the same spot. It also means that you’ll need to prepare three water balloons per player in advance, just in case.

3. Unlimited Do Overs

With this final option, players get as many opportunities as they need to complete their leg of the relay. They have to continue from where they burst their water balloon.

Again, try to have volunteers on hand to replace the burst water balloons. One thing to bear in mind is that you’ll need to prepare a much larger number of water balloons. If a player uses too many on their turn, it could result in some players not getting a chance, so this isn’t recommended unless you have a small youth group and lots of balloons!

Winner

This will depend on which of the three options above you choose. With both the one and three strikes options, the winning team will either be

  • The one that has the most players complete their leg of the race without using up their allocation of balloons, or
  • The fastest team to finish if all their players make it round with a balloon intact

If playing the unlimited do overs option, the winning team is the one that finishes first.

Prize

If you want to offer a prize, an option that the youth will love is to let the winners throw the rest of the balloons at the leaders!

If you liked this idea, check out all our other game ideas.

Question: Have you ever played this water balloon relay? If so, did you add in anything else or have different rules? Or can you think of any other good prizes/rewards for the winners? Let us know in the comments below.

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