20 Three-Minute Brain Breaks
Wednesday's guest post about why kids need to move from pediatric occupational therapist Loren Shlaes was so popular that I decided to follow it up with a list of Brain Breaks you can use with your students. These are great to use anytime your students are feeling restless and are struggling to pay attention. Most of these will only take a few minutes, and then you can get back to the lesson with your students ready to focus on the lesson at hand.5-4-3-2-1. In this simple game, students stand up and the teacher (or leader) has them do five different movements in descending order. For example the teacher would say: "Do fivejumping jacks, spin around four times, hop on one foot threetimes, walk all the way around the classroom two times, give your neighbor one high-five (pausing in between each task for students to do it).Trading Places Have students stand behind their pushed-in chairs.
The Best Resources For Teaching/Learning About How To Write Compare/Contrast Essays
I recently realized that I have specific “Best” lists for many different types of essays (see All My “Best” Lists On Teaching & Learning How To Write – In One Place!), but I’ve never created one for Compare/Contrast. So, here goes: Here are instructions for a compare/contrast unit project from one of my class blog. Writing to Compare and Contrast from Citelighter on Vimeo.
List of Conversation Topics
One of the most frustrating things I have ever experienced around a girl, is if I and her run out of things to talk about. Since you found this post I assume you know what I’m talking about, and maybe you are interested in learning how to avoid awkward silence. I’m thinking about the teeth pooling moments where the awkward silence just takes over the situation, you are just sitting their smiling while desperately in your mind scrambling for something just mildly interesting say, but you just can think of anything, you mind is a total black out, you can’t even remember your own name at this point. Finally you hear yourself saying something completely uninteresting, like: “sooo.. do you come here often”, she says “no its my first time!” And then the conversation dries up once again, the awkward silence start to eat you both up from the inside until one of you can’t stand the social pressure and thus make up some excuse to leave. Talk about Past Experiences:
Icebreaker: Show me a picture of…
Image credit: Follow me on twitter @RobbioDobbio Thanks to Nicky Hockly at The Consultants-e for the inspiration for this lesson plan. It’s an icebreaking lesson in which students can use their mobiles (shock horror) for intermediate levels and up.
Energizing Brain Breaks: Toe Tapping Energizing Brain Break
Toe Tapping 1. Stand Up.2. Face your partner.3. Both you and your partner put out your right leg and tap your right feet together 1 time and say "1" out loud.4. Tap your left feet together 3 times and say "3" out loud.5.
Mr. Ferlazzo's U.S. History Classes Blog
Think of the people you learned about in this unit who were "reformers." They worked for justice, and tried to make life better. Pick one of them who you would like to learn more about. Then think of someone today who you think is a reformer.
10 Great Classroom Icebreakers
1. Self-Portrait. Have your students draw themselves. After they have done this, collect the papers and hang them up for the whole class to see. Now have students try to guess who the artists was for each picture.
101 Conversation Starters
(Also see How to Start a Conversation) Ice Breakers Where did you grow up?Do you have any pets?Do you have any siblings?
5 Tips for keeping kids active throughout the day
It doesn’t take many weeks into the school year before you start noticing a change in your students. Gone is the excitement generated at the beginning of the school year when learning is fresh. Now, students are struggling to stay on task. To boost engagement, give your learners ways to stay active throughout the day.
5 Fascinating Sites for Seeing and Exploring the Universe
Space. The final frontier. If you love gazing at the stars, and beautiful pictures of galaxies, the Internet has a lot to offer.
Ice Breakers (Icebreakers) from ResidentAssistant.com
GamesRA Contributor2014-09-18T09:47:09+00:00 Whether you need an activity for a staff meeting or a teambuilder for your floor, this section of the site provides you with ideas and instructions to help energize groups and bring people together! Do you have a favorite icebreaker or teambuilder? Please share it today! Ice Blocking Posted by: RA Contributor Category: Ice Breakers, Program Ideas, Reviewed, Social/Community Building, Team Builders
Why Kids Need to Move, Touch and Experience to Learn
When students use their bodies in the learning process, it can have a big effect, even if it seems silly or unconnected to the learning goal at hand. Researchers have found that when students use their bodies while doing mathematical storytelling (like with word problems, for example), it changes the way they think about math. “We understand language in a richer, fuller way if we can connect it to the actions we perform,” said Sian Beilock, professor of psychology at the University of Chicago. Consider this word problem:
Super quick motivating activities: building the story
An engaging speaking activity for intermediate level learners Instructions: Get learners to select an interesting image from their course book, preferably one that has a few people doing something.Arrange the class into groups to talk about it.Tell them as a group to choose one person in the picture and to think in detail about them; they can decide any number of things: the person’s name; their age; their job; what they are saying or thinking; how they are feeling; where they are going; what they have in their bag; who they are visiting, and so on.Get each learner in the group to help build up as big a story as possible using only the picture as a source of inspiration.
Classroom Icebreakers for Back to School
The first day of a new school year can be awkward and nerve-wracking for both teachers and students. Why not break the ice that day (or week) with a few, fun, getting-to-know you activities? Giving your students a chance to share special facts about themselves and learn about their teacher at the same time will help ease first-day jitters. And it helps to build a sense of community in the class, an important requirement as they collaborate with each other throughout the year. Below are some of my favorite icebreaker activities.
