The Internet Game

I've been thinking about how to teach fairly young kids about how the Internet works, and I've come up with a game. I think this would be appropriate for 3rd to 5th grade or so. I call it "The Internet Game."

Begin by separating about a third of the class to be "computers," then the rest are "routers." (This could also be half and half, which would make it easy for the two groups to switch roles after a while.) The computers get into a large circle, with the routers all standing inside.

The computers get to write simple "packets" on index cards, addressed with To, From, and Message. These packets have to be sent to other computers. These could be free-form, write messages to whoever you want; or there could be a rule that you must send a message back, which would simulate a client/server request and response. The routers must pass the packets so that the packets get closer to their destinations. The routers aren't allowed to move from their spot, but they can spin to face other people.

For a more advanced version, one could split the computers into clients and servers, and assign specific server roles. One student could be the search engine, which would send back information about other servers. Pages sent from servers to clients could have "links" to other pages on other servers. The teacher could choose a router to break (sit down?), forcing packets to be routed around. The routers could be arranged a certain way to produce bottlenecks.

I'm not in the education field, so I don't know what primary schoolers are being taught about the Internet, or how. I know interactive games are much more interesting than drawing diagrams on a chalkboard. This game seems a little reminiscent of the Telephone Game, used teach very young primary school kids about rumors. I would be shocked if something like this Internet Game doesn't exist, but a quick Google search didn't turn up anything like it. If you're an educator, or otherwise, please let me know what you think!