Incorporating Brain Breaks

It’s spring, and the weather is stunning, and teachers are packing and the walls are bare…so, how do you maintain student engagement, motivation, and mood?

According to Judy Willis, MD, in “Using Brain Breaks Restore Students’ Focus,” “Brain breaks are planned learning activity shifts that mobilize different networks of the brain. These shifts allow those regions that are blocked by stress or high-intensity work to revitalize. Brain breaks, by switching activity to different brain networks, allow the resting pathways to restore their calm focus and foster optimal mood, attention, and memory.”  She adds that middle and high school students need 3-5 minutes of brain break following 20-30 minutes of focus.

So, what are some quick and easy brain breaks to build in to your lesson plans?

• Lead students in mindful breathing or meditation
• Read aloud to class a short passage from a relevant, engaging book or article or poem
• Have students do some stretches, or move to a different part of the room
• Lead them in singing a song relevant to content
• Create a classroom-appropriate limerick or poem together dealing with the content
•  Have students pretend to jump rope
• Ask students to share with their partners a personal connection to the learning
• Have a two-minute music break--even better if the music can connect to the content
• Have students toss a beach ball to the next person who is going to respond to a question
• Have students move, or act as if they were a biological process, a mathematical process, a social studies concept, a literary character, etc.
• Ask students to stand with a partner and perform an energizing brain break (example: Lap Tap: stand up, take right hand and tap a slow beat on left thigh, tap right foot  to the ground faster than the right-hand tap, then switch sides. Last, tap opposite thighs with hands and then tap both feet faster than hands).  This is from the book Energizing Brain Breaks by David Sladkey, which contains 49 additional energizing movements and challenging physical maneuvers. You might also ask your Health and Fitness teacher for movement ideas.

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