✋ How to play Slapjack

Easy rules, to read aloud 🔊

1. Share out all the cards face down.
2. Take turns putting your top card face up in the middle.
3. If it is a jack, slap the pile gently!
4. The first hand on the jack wins the pile.
5. Do not slap any other card.
6. Get all the cards to win.

The full rules

1. Deal the whole deck face down so everyone has a stack about the same size. Do not look at your cards.
2. Going around to the left, each player turns their top card face up onto one pile in the middle. Flip it away from you so everyone sees it at once.
3. When a jack appears, anyone may slap it. The player whose hand is on the bottom, touching the jack, takes the whole pile and puts it face down under their stack.
4. The player to the left of the winner starts the next run of flips.
5. If you slap a card that is not a jack, give your top card to the player who turned that card over.
6. If you run out of cards, you stay in and can try to slap the next jack. If someone else wins that jack, or you slap a wrong card, you are out.

How to win: The player who ends up with all 52 cards wins. For a shorter game, set a timer, and the most cards when it rings wins.

Tips

• Keep slaps soft, with a flat open hand, so no fingers get hurt.
• Watch the middle pile, not your own stack.
• Take rings off first, and play on a table, not a lap.

What it practises

recognizing jacks, paying attention, quick reactions, gentle hands.

Other ways to play

• Say it as you slap. You must say "Slapjack!" as you slap, or the pile does not count.
• Match slap. Slap when a card matches the number of the card just under it, like a four on a four, instead of on jacks.