NEW: Brain Breaks for the Classroom

**UPDATE: A more informative post as well as updates can be found by clicking HERE and HERE.

**To get helpful assembly instructions, click HERE.

I LOVE Brain Breaks during the school day- they are simple, quick, easy, and can really elevate the mood of myself and my students.

In the past, I have created them off of the top of my head, made posters, had the same breaks over and over- nothing seemed to work.

Then, last year, I came up with a simple poster that listed all of the Brain Breaks with tiny pictures to help the kids remember. I would introduce them one at a time throughout the year and we would build a nice repertoire by May.

This year, I added a few more to the list of options and decided to switch from a poster to a fun popsicle stick system:

I think these are not just fun, but such a more interactive experience! I will have a student helper grab a break for us, or I can still glance through the options and choose one I think will work particularly well for our needs at the time.

Hint: The "hand washing" break is a fantastic activity before Writer's Workshop-it gets their hands and forearms energized and ready for writing!

I simply cut out the circles, mounted them on construction paper (you could just print them out on cardstock to save that step), laminated them since they get quite a bit of use, and hot glued a popsicle stick to the back- easy peasy!

Now, we have more wall space where our poster used to hang and can now bring our Brain Breaks with us wherever we go!

I have listed this in my Teachers Pay Teachers Store and hope you can swing by to pick it up. If you use these, I would love to hear how they go in your class- leave me a comment!

Enjoy!