Carl Knott, age 9, of Shreveport, La., for his question:

IS A SHUFFLEBOARD COURT VERY LONG?

Shuffleboard is a game played on a smooth surface, such as pavements, gymnasium floors and ship decks. The court must be six feet wide and 52 feet long.

Two persons can play shuffleboard against each other, or four persons can form two opposing teams. Each side has four disks. The game is also sometimes called shovelboard.

A shuffleboard disk is six inches in diameter. Players push the disks with cues from one end of the court to the other. Two triangles 18 feet apart from the scoring areas.

Each triangle has one area which provides 10 points, two 8 point areas and two 7 point areas. In addition, there is a 10 off area at the base of each triangle.

After all of the disks have been pushed, the players add up their scores and move to the other end of the court and continue play. The winning score may be 50, 75 or 100 points. The winner is the team with the highest scores in two out of three games.