Educational Focus
In this fun Bball game children are encouraged to group basketballs together according to their color.
Skills: Enhance grouping skills, apply planning and strategizing skills and reinforce concentration.
The game has 5 levels that vary by the number of color options available for grouping, which range from 3 – 7 color groups.

Together Time Tips
Grouping is fun! Here are some fun activities for you and your child to enjoy any time!

GROUPING COLLAGE
Here’s what you will need:

• Large sheet of paper
• Glue
• Old magazines
• Dry lentils, pasta

Provide your child with a large sheet of paper, glue, and a mix of at least 20 items to group onto their paper. The items can be found or made by the children, or they can use dry lentils, pasta and pictures from old magazines. Now, have your little one group by type (i.e. different pasta shapes, or by different size groups of an item, by twos, fives, tens, etc.) Have your child place their groupings on the paper before gluing them down. Discuss what you are doing with your youngster as your work progresses.
Finally, exhibit your child’s work to the whole family!

GROUPING FUN
Here’s what you will need:

• Construction paper
• Scissors
• Crayons, magic markers

To enhance learning how to group shapes and colors, cut out different shapes (squares, circles, diamonds, ovals, etc.)  in a variety of colors. Discuss with your child each shape and color. Then, ask your child to group all shapes that are of a specific color, or a specific shape. Take turns grouping!
 
GROUPING NUMBERS
Here’s what you will need:

• Beans, buttons (any items that can be used for counting and grouping)
• Dice

Give your child 25 items. Then, ask your youngster to create groups of five. How many groups will they have? Encourage your child to make predictions before grouping their items. Increase or decrease the number of items and continue the activity. Now, have your youngster throw the dice to get a number. Work together to group your items according to that number on the dice. Have fun grouping!

Score
You can “score high” by choosing groups of basketballs with the same color. But remember, the bigger the group, the more points you score. Scoring is displayed on the screen and updates each time that the player removes balls from the board.
The game gives a bonus if the group is larger than two and increases scoring per level.
Get into the BBall action!

Help
Begin by helping your child maneuver the cursor on the screen using the arrow keys to move around.  Help your child spot groups of basketballs with the same color. Be sure to explain that the bigger the group, the more points they get. As you move from level to level, more color options will be available – making the game harder. Help your child plan ahead and strategize in order to group the most basketballs of a particular color. Tell them to try and visualize what the board will look like after a particular move before they actually make the move. Once your child has clicked on all possible color groups in a certain level, “Level Completion” will appear on the screen and the game will continue at the next level. Good luck finding groups for hoops!