DIY Mini Hockey Game

Have you been watching all the amazing Olympic hockey games our U.S. teams have played? It's awesome!

I decided that there's no better way to teach my boys about the sport, than to have them play. Of course, they don't know how to ice skate, don't have all the necessary pads, and there's no kids team here in our town. Not to be discouraged by these obstacles, I created a paper rink and plastic sticks and puck.

Our miniature hockey game was a blast!

To make the sticks and puck, I printed a page with them pictured, and traced them onto shrink film using a permanent marker. When I baked the film to shrink it, I laid a piece of parchment under AND over it, to keep the thin sticks from curling up.

The rink is made from three pieces of heavyweight cardstock, taped together. 

To make the goals, I printed two homemade templates on more cardstock and with a few cuts, more than a few folds, and about four pieces of clear tape, they were ready to mount on the rink (simply use glue or tape to attach).

To download the 5-page PDF of this game from Google Drive, click here.

(Don't have shrink film? Use two spoons for sticks and a button as a puck!)

We read some amazing books to supplement our play time.

Face Off by Nick Fauchald provided simple instructions on how hockey played and the basic rules of the game.

How Hockey Works by Keltie Thomas was a fact-filled book containing information such as the history of the sport, explanation of the rules, legends, etc. My oldest son (age 8) was in heaven. He was fascinated by the rubber puck and how it was once made of two pieces, which separated during a game, half going into the goal.

Rick Maloney and Felicia Zekauskas' The Magic Hockey Stick, is a fiction book, about how Wayne Gretsky's stick lit one young girl's hockey skills on fire. It's a heart-warming story that even my preschooler loved.