Brain Breaks

In my main placement and my dyad placement I have heard both teachers talk about brain breaks for students. While, I've heard them talk about them I haven't seen them used as often as I thought I would.

This week I was working with a student one on one and he kept complaining about needing a drink of water or needing to go to the bathroom. I saw him as just trying to prolong working on the assignment so I told him that we needed to finish the problems first. I could see he was having a hard time focusing and I was starting to burn out as well.

I finally told the student that we were going to get up and get a drink of water and then come back to the problem. It was about a 1 minute break but it made a huge difference in both of us and our stamina to finish working on the problem. Both of us were much more focused and relaxed once we stepped away from the assignment and gave ourselves and our brains a break.

This experience has made me realize that an important part of my classroom will be to have brain breaks regularly and when I notice kids losing their stamina. It doesn't just benefit the kids but I saw it also helping me as a teacher.

Here is a list of some brain breaks that teachers can use in the classroom.