padding around of the palm the hand. comfortable and safe. There also is finger hole to keep the fingers the in gloveball soit doesn’t drop out. index finger. web The helps to keep the leather between the sewn thumb and and There aweb is fingers. made of calledthread rawhide. glove together sewn are leather with gloves. ofbaseball abaseball parts The One cowhide make can or four three called cowhide. It strong is and flexible. Most gloves baseball made are of leather Making Glove aBaseball gloves players wear today. gloves looked different very than the most players wore gloves. baseball The gloves were By used. the early 1900s, their hands.with bare Ouch! to and catchgrab balls line fly drives not wear gloves. baseball They had those days, players baseball did tostarted get popular. Back in the War, Civil After baseball The History Bare ofstory the glove. baseball glove.a baseball Here’s the team, you’re going to need playground, or on abaseball thein backyard, at the you’reIf who akid plays catch Gloves have padding inside each Each glove has space for the thumb Around 1869, baseball the first

The StoryoftheBaseballGlove

Good Catch!

safe and play your best! glovea baseball designed to help you stay teammate to catch the runner. base quickly grab and to the throw ball a when they stop line drives, they can scoop up grounders. a better chance to and catchto balls fly around the Their palm. gloves give them and adeep pocket, which the is space the pitch. grip sothat batters can’t predict pitches. their They use glove to hide their different in the ball ways for different hole for the index finger. Pitchers grip help the pitcher target. see his the colored of the catcher’s trim glove lightning fast pitches. large The size and paddingthick to protect their hands from Whatever position you play, there is Infielders wear smaller gloves so Outfielders’ gloves have long fingers pitcherThe aglove wears a with Catchers wear big round gloves with baseball gloves.baseball There are severalThere are of kinds Fits like aGlove paddingThe protects aplayer’s

hands injuries from caused by fast pitches or hard hits. colors. come in all sizes, shapes, and baseball gloves are constantly changing. They

The look and shape of

© 2010 by Lucy Calkins and Kathleen Tolan, from Units of Study for Teaching Reading: A Curriculum for the Reading Workshop, Grades 3–5 (Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann). This page may be reproduced for classroom use only.