These “Brain Breaks” Are What Your Kids Need Right Now

Inside: Brain Breaks can help keep kids active AND better able to learn. Here’s why movement matters so much for students, especially right now.

Kids sit an awful lot in school these days.

Some schools are limiting recess and reducing (or even cutting) PE classes. Many schools are putting an emphasis on test scores and test prep, leaving kids spending serious time being sedentary in the classroom. And of course, some schools are shifting online right now, leaving kids sitting for hours at a time.

What are Brain Breaks? 

It may not be realistic for schools to add in more time for recess or extra PE. But students can easily be given “Brain Breaks” throughout the day.

Brain Breaks are short, energizing bursts of activity that boost blood flow, send oxygen to the brain, and help kids better retain information.

Research has shown that Brain Breaks increase students’ on-task behavior AND the amount of physical activity they get every day so it’s a win-win.

It can be as simple as taking five minutes to stand up, stretch, and run in place next to the desk (my son’s first grade teacher took his class on a short walk around the building every day). 

Ideally, students should get multiple Brain Breaks in the day and be active in other ways as well. Here’s an ideal schedule for students, compliments of fellow dietitian Dayle Hayes, who presented the information at a workshop I attended at the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics’ Food & Nutrition Conference & Expo:

• Walk to school
• BREAKFAST
• Classroom learning with hourly energizers (Brain Breaks)
• Recess (It’s been shown that kids waste less food, eat more fruits and vegetables, and have better behavior when they have recess BEFORE lunch versus after lunch.)
• LUNCH
• Classroom learning with hourly energizers (Brain Breaks)
• Recess
• Classroom learning with hourly energizers (Brain Breaks)

You might also like: Here’s What You Need For Active Indoor Recess

Why Movement Matters

Being seated for long periods of time has some major drawbacks for kids. Not only does it make it tough for them to get enough physical activity in the day, but it also makes it harder to actually pay attention and learn.

Angela Hanscom, a pediatric occupational therapist, writes in the Washington Post:

Children naturally start fidgeting in order to get the movement their body so desperately needs and is not getting enough of to “turn their brain on.” What happens when the children start fidgeting? We ask them to sit still and pay attention; therefore, their brain goes back to “sleep.” In order for children to learn, they need to be able to pay attention. In order to pay attention, we need to let them move!

Movement actually does turn on the brain. Look how activity can literally light up areas of a child’s brain that allow for better learning:

Brain Break Ideas

If you’re a teacher, consider incorporating Brain Breaks into the day. If you’re a parent, talk to your child’s teacher about the idea. Here are some resources and videos that make Brain Breaks easy and fun to do. And they’re FREE!

Brain Break Activities with Screens

• Move to Learn Fitness Energizers: More than 30 fitness videos for students K-8 with routines kids can do alongside their desks.
• Go Noodle Brain Breaks: Tons of free, short videos to get kids moving in the classroom, including short Zumba routines (my son’s teacher uses these when they have indoor recess and he loves it!).
• Teach Train Love: This teacher has compiled several lists of fun Brain Break videos from YouTube.

Brain Break Activities without Screens

• Energizers for Grades K-2: Ideas for incorporating academic concepts into physical activity, such as games that mix jumping and running in place with learning letters and numbers.
• Action for Healthy Kids: A Pinterest page full of classroom brain break ideas, including some for middle school, with printable options.
• We Are Teachers: A collection of 50 brain breaks, including many ideas that are screen-free, from Sanford Fit. 
• Sanford Health FitBoost Cards: Printable cards with moving break brain exercises that take only 3 minutes to complete.  
• Sanford Health Mindful Moments: Another option for printable cards that focus on still, mindful moments by guiding the student to imagine specific scenarios.