Yesterday afternoon, the Herons took advantage of a sunny few minutes at the end of the day to play "Alaskan Baseball." It's a silly game and we were pressed for time so I didn't explain it very carefully, figuring we would get it as we went.
Because of this confusion and lack of clarity, the first group up to bat scored ten points in the first moments of the game. The other group hadn't been sure how to get the runner out. I didn't make a big deal of it – figuring we just had time for a few more at bats.
Every other at bat resulted in two or three runs. Had the first team not scored ten points in that first at bat, the game would have been even. When the "winning" team kept bringing up the score, I tried to point out that maybe the first at bat shouldn't count. But many of the first team felt that it was fair. "You explained the rules…" "It was chance…"
Hmmm…I gave the second team, the team that was behind, a hint about a kind of play that could lead to a lot of runs and was not technically against the rules. Sure enough, the first team erupted in protests.
We gathered up to talk about what had happened. So often, when we are the beneficiaries of the system (poorly explained rules in this case) it can be really hard to "call ourselves out" and admit that something wasn't fair to others. There were, to be sure, some kids in that first group who wanted to call the first round a practice round so that we could start at an equal place. But there were also kids who were loathe to give up their runs (at least until they saw how it felt when the other team had an advantage.)
The game took place at the very end of the day and we didn't get to fully explore other times we've been in a similar situation. The implications go far beyond a silly game of baseball.
The Rookery 
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