Flag Bandits: Team Bank Tag
A team flag-pulling game: each team steals the other team's flags and stores them in its bank, while players who lose their flags can raid the other bank to get one back. The team with the most flags in its bank at the end wins. Students practice dodging and team strategy.
How to play
- Make 2 teams of 12 or 13, one with red ribbons and one with blue. Each player tucks 2 flags at their waist, one on each side, hanging at least 12 inches (2 min).
- Mark a 30 x 20 m field. At each end, place a hoop as that team's bank, surrounded by a 3 m circle of cones where no one can pull flags.
- On the whistle, everyone tries to pull opponents' flags. Each stolen flag is run to your own bank and dropped in the hoop.
- A player with no flags runs to the other team's bank, takes back one of their own flags, tucks it in inside the safe circle, and returns to play.
- Each round lasts 4 minutes. On the final whistle, count the flags in each bank: those are the team's points.
- Play 3 rounds; between rounds, each team gets 1 minute to decide how many attack and how many protect flagless teammates.
Rules
- Only pull flags; no grabbing, pushing, or holding players.
- Flags must hang loose, never tied or stuffed into pants.
- Carry only one stolen flag at a time to your bank.
- No flag pulling inside the bank's cone circle.
Variations
Easier
Use one flag per player and move the banks closer to midfield.
Standard
Two flags per player, banks at the end lines, and flag recovery at the other team's bank.
Harder
To recover a flag at the other bank, a player must first pass a hoop over their body.
Adaptations
- Limited mobility: the student serves as banker in their hoop, storing flags and handing one to anyone who comes to recover it, or plays with longer flags and a support buddy.
- Autism: draw the steal-bank-recover route on the ground in chalk and assign a go-to buddy.
- Fitness level: fitter students can wear three flags, making them a target and balancing the game.
Learning goals
- Pull flags and protect their own with quick movement.
- Decide as a team when to attack and when to recover.
- Follow the no-contact rules.
Equipment for a class of 25
- colored ribbons: 56
- hoops: 2
- cones: 16
Teacher tip
Check that all flags hang the same length before starting. If one team turtles up on defense, shrink the field or give double points for flags stolen in the last minute.
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