• Category: Uncategorized
• Published Dated: July 30, 2018
• Written by: Susan

I first published this a few years ago.  I mentioned teaching my young granddaughter a card game called Golf. It is a game we play with some adult friends, and was easy to teach to my then 6 year-old granddaughter. She enjoyed the game, and didn’t realize she was “Doing math” to play and total her points. We played this for well over an hour on an airplane ride too, and it’s now a game we play whenever we get together.

The game is played with 2-6 players. Use one deck of cards. Each player is dealt 4 cards face down per round. Play 18 rounds-hence the name, Golf.
Object: Score the least number of points  
Card values: Ace = 1 point; 2 through 10 are face value (2 points up to 10 points);
Jacks and Queens are each 10 points;
Kings = ZERO!;
PAIR = ZERO!;
Three of a kind = -5! (That’s minus 5);
Four of a kind = – 10! (Minus 10)
Note:  1 King = 0 points, 2 Kings= 0, 3 kings= -5, and 4 kings = -10
Therefore, Kings, pairs, 3 and 4 of a kind, Aces and low point cards are better than high point cards.
Jacks or Queens, 9,8,7,6,5’s, unless you have a pair, or 3 or 4 of a kind are high points.

After each round, the value for the 4 cards is added up for each person’s score. I love this part! “Doing the math!”
Examples: Jack, Queen, 4 and Ace: (10, 10, 4, 1) = 25 points
Ace, Ace, 2, King: (0, 2, 0) = 2 points
8, 8, 8, 6: -5, 6 = 1 point
5, 3, 9, Jack = 27 points

How to play: Each player is dealt 4 cards face down. Place your 4 cards face down in a square, and keep 2 cards close to you, and 2 cards farther away. You may look at the 2 cards CLOSE to you, but NOT at the other 2. The rest of the cards are in a pile face down and become the pile to pick from. One card is faced up, and that is the Discard pile.

Here’s where the fun, chance, choices,and risk start!

1. At each of your four turns for this Golf round, you may choose either from the face up discard or from the face down pile. You cannot look at the card from the pile and then change your mind. Once you pick from the pile, it’s yours for that turn. You may choose to keep the card or discard it. Everyone can see this card because it will now become one of your face up cards OR you will discard it.

2. At each turn, you must face up one card and discard one card. If you don’t like the card you picked from the pile, then discard it and you must face up one of the four cards. You can choose to face up one of two cards close to you that you looked at and you know what they are, OR take a chance and turn over one of the two UNKNOWN cards. Once you do that, you may not change your mind. That card stays face up now, and may not be moved or exchanged again. If you are stuck with a high value card, you never know, you may get lucky and pick another to match for a pair! Or, maybe you picked a low-scoring card OR a card to match another you have to make a pair!

If you chose to keep the card you picked from the pile, you can place it face up in place of either one of the cards you looked at that you don’t like, OR, take a chance, say you are keeping it,  and place it face up in place of one of the UNKNOWN cards. Once you turn over the unknown card to discard it, you must discard it even if it’s a card you like.

*You cannot peek to see what’s under the UNKNOWN before deciding what to do.

Once a card is faced up, it cannot be exchanged.

At this point, the next player has a choice of taking your discard or picking from the pile. If the next player LIKES the discard, then it would be picked and turned over in place of one of her other face down cards. For example: Discard is a Jack. Player 2 knows one of the cards she looked at is a Jack, so Player 2 picks it for a PAIR, and turns it over in place of another card-either an UNKNOWN or the other card Player 2 knows she has, and doesn’t want. Or, if Player 1 had discarded an UNKNOWN card which happened to be a King or Ace, or other low card, Player 2 might want that because it has a low score value.

Play continues until all four cards are face up. Score is tallied and then another set of four cards are dealt, until 18 rounds of Golf are played. Lowest score, like in golf, wins!

Children will have fun making choices to play the game, and then adding up their four cards. They can total their running scores as well. It lends well to to teaching regrouping of tens and ones, and use of negative points and subtracting! My granddaughter wanted to tally my score as well.
Even more important, this is good quality family time!