The French word "marelle" came up in a document I had to translate.
In English it's generally called hopscotch but I'm sure it's called something else in Hartlepoolese, though I can't for the life of me remember what.
It was only the girls who ever played it at our school (or rather at their school; the M-F axe came down at 7 years old in those days, which is why all baby boomers are homosexuals).

There was a bloke who wrote a book a few years back on all the old schoolyard games, and their names. Not much help though Mr Monty, sorry.

As a mincing queen of some repute, and fellow boy's only from 11 educatee, I'm sure I can remember the genteel young ladies of Rossmere playing something called "itchy-bay". But that may have been some figfart of my imagination.

Au contraire Senhor Nova, I think you've hit the nail right on the head.
Damn, if I hadn't already sent the translation in I so would have put itchy-bay instead of hopscotch.

After some research, I can say it definitely is a word that needs adding to our dictionary of unique Hartlepoolese words, if anyone can find that thread.

And I only thought we gave the world the words "Doyle" and "Shan"

Dut
Elish (don't even think about putting an extra L or a H on the front)
Ding
Rarf
Wellaye

I can remember marking up the bays for itchybay with some chalky stuff we used to find lying around in small pieces. Kind of soft white stone encased in in paper. Thinking about it, it was probably asbestos from building sites!

It could have been a bit of the, much missed, white dog poo!

Dogs don't use toilet paper, silly.

I believe the standard term used over the border is bob hat or cap.
Problem is Bob Marley fans have now usurped the term, so when you Google "bob cap" all you get is Rasta paraphernalia.

Beanie.

I thought the bays were ready-marked by the flagstones.
I confess I never understood the point of the game or the rules, but the lasses certainly adored it while the lads looked on mystified.
There was another game I never really got the gist of, called red lighter or some soundalike, which accommodated both boys and girls.

1) Concrete/tarmac at our school so girls had to draw freehand.
2) I think that may have been a Dutch import!

Bewer

Bishop is correct. Paving stones didn't exist in our playground either. Besides, they wouldn't have been arranged in the right order for itchybay. You needed three squares in a row before the other squares branched out into alternate twos and ones.

It was quite a hard game. You had to throw a stone into the right square without touching any lines, or you missed your go. You had to choose exactly the right stone, or it either bounced off-course or didn't reach the furthest squares. And then you had to hop up the grid also without touching any lines. I didn't win very often.