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As the teacher counts down from 10 to 1, the students must remember a series of motions that go with certain numbers.

This would be a great routine for those "out of control" moments that you need to bring your students back to a calm state.

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Wiggle Cool Down: An SEL Kernels Brain Game | Greater Good In Education

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As the teacher counts down from 10 to 1, the students must remember a series of motions that go with certain numbers.

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Students practice identifying their emotions and use a mindful breathing song to help regulate their emotions.

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Evidence That It Works

In a study, undergraduate students who completed a 15-minute focused breathing exercise reported fewer negative emotions in response to a series of slides that displayed negative images when compared with students who didn't complete the exercise. These results suggest that focused breathing exercises can help students' improve their ability to regulate their emotions. Furthermore, a review of research on the benefits of mindfulness-based school interventions suggests that mindfulness may be beneficial for children and adolescents in building resilience and improving their cognitive abilities, such as attention and creativity.

Why Does It Matter?

Stress, anger, and anxiety can impair not only our health-but our judgment and attention skills. One way to navigate these difficult feelings is through the practice of "mindfulness," the ability to pay careful attention to what one's thinking, feeling, and sensing in the present moment without judging those thoughts and feelings as good or bad. Countless studies link mindfulness to better health, lower anxiety, and greater resilience to stress.

One basic method for teaching students mindfulness is through mindful breathing-focused attention on the in-and-out pattern of breath. After setting aside time to practice mindful breathing, students may find it easier to focus their attention on their breath in their daily life-an important skill to help them deal with stress, anxiety, and negative emotions. Mindful breathing can help students learn to cool themselves down when their tempers flare, and it can sharpen their skills of concentration, so they may make the most out of their time at school.

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The Oooh Aaah Song | Greater Good In Education

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Students practice identifying their emotions and use a mindful breathing song to help regulate their emotions.

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Brain Games for "Focus Power": A Set of SEL Kernels Practices

Introduce students to “Focus Power”–the ability to sustain attention and ignore distractions when needed–and then choose a quick “Focus Power” game to play as a brain break to help them develop these skills.

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Brain Games for “Focus Power”: A Set of SEL Kernels Practices | Greater Good In Education

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Introduce students to “Focus Power”--the ability to sustain attention and ignore distractions when needed--and then choose a “Focus Power” game to help them develop these skills.

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1. Find a comfortable position for sitting or standing. Stretch your spine tall giving your lungs plenty of room to breathe

2. Look at the palm of one hand

3. with the pointer finger of your other hand, trace up and down the sides of your fingers while breathing to a pattern.

1. Start at the outside base of your thumb and breathe in trace up: 1-2-3. Exhale and trace down your thumb breathing out: 1-2-3. Counting this way represents ¾ time.

2. Change the number of breaths going up and down each finger to represent different time signatures. 2 breaths = 2/4 time, 4 breaths = 4/4 time, etc

4. Switch to the do the other hand. Is it the same? Is it harder? Is it easier?

secondary resource with research-backed explanations: https://ggie.berkeley.edu/practice/finger-tracing-mindful-breathing-for-students/#tab__2

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Mindful Brain Breaks: Silly Songs Side By Side

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his activity can help children (Ages 4+) improve their focusing and listening abilities as well as connect with their emotions. There is a playlist in the link above that you can use to play different songs, or, you can lean on your own musical preferences as well!

1. Play the songs one at a time and ask the children whether they think the song is happy or sad. Ask students how the song has made them feel (with 1st graders, you may want to show the attached "How does the music make you feel 1.pdfl" poster on your display to help them identify different emotions) . Finally, inquire as to why they chose a specific emotion. What is it about the song that makes them happy, sad, or another emotion? Is it the singer's voice? Pitch? Volume? Speed? Instrument?

1. If you are making this a routine, you could play just one song per activity to create a short brain break, or, play multiple songs for a longer experience depending on the need

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Mindfulness Games for Kids - Feeling The Music - Blissful Kids

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Make mindfulness fun with this musical mindfulness game! Helps kids improve focusing and listening skills, and get in touch with emotions.

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This game is about using self-control to manage how you sing a familiar song– loud, soft, fast, slow. Body (movement, voice, etc.) control is a great way to practice self-control.

Click link for visual poster for student reference.

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Note: Click here to download and print a card version of this practice that can be added to the other Brain Games practices to make an easy-to-use hand-held collection. See the SEL Kernels pack for additional activities.
The Big Idea

This game is about using self-control to manage how you sing a familiar song-loud, soft, fast, slow. Body (movement, voice, etc.) control is a great way to practice self-control.

Instructions

Introduce Stop and Think Power to students, if necessary.

Say the Big Idea (see above).

Create large cards with different styles (e.g., loud, quiet, quick, slow) visually represented with words and/or images. Choose a classic children's song that has associated motions that you'd like to sing with the class (e.g., "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes"; "5 Little Monkeys"; "Hokey Pokey", etc.).

Ask students to spread out and find their own space in the room.

Say:
We are all going to sing ________ together. Let's sing the song normally first to learn the words and motions. Repeat after me and follow along. (Lead students through the song.)

Say:
Now let's try singing the same song in different styles. I have four cards that say "fast, slow, loud, and quiet." Let's try singing in one of the styles. (Show one card, and sing together).

Continue singing new rounds in different styles.

Must do

Must require students to replace the automatic style of singing a song with a new one.

Can adapt

Change the song and/or the styles.

Adaptations

Variations: switch styles mid-song or invite students to choose styles.

This game gives students clear practice for common classroom expectations such as "slow down" or "use a quiet voice." Incorporate other styles that you'd like to work on in your classroom.

Invite children to create their own styles (e.g., robotic, like an opera singer, like a rapper, etc.).

After the activity, debrief

We had to use our Stop and Think Power to do something different than what we were used to. It can be hard. How did that feel? What can help us when it's hard to do this?

Let's pay attention to styles today. When I tell us to use "quiet" voices during _____, think about how to Stop and Think to talk in a different style.

When are other times that you're asked to do something in a specific way? Do you always feel like doing things that way?

For more debriefing questions, see Brain Games Practice.

Tips for success

Translate the different style words (i.e., loud, quiet, quick, slow) into the native languages of bilingual learners, and add those words to your cards.

If you have children in your group who have experienced trauma, use caution with the "loud" styles, and only use it if you think it won't be too stressful for the students.

Source

This practice is part of the SEL Kernels project developed by the EASEL Lab at Harvard University.

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Sing It with Style: An SEL Kernels Brain Game | Greater Good In Education

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Students sing a familiar song loud, soft, fast, or slow.

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Script provided to read to students as you lead them through this breathing activity.

Can be used with all ages

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Rock-a-bye: Mindful Breathing for Elementary Students | Greater Good In Education

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A script for educators that helps young students calm themselves by focusing on their breathing.

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Use the prompts each time you complete the activity to activate thinking from different perspectives while listening to a 4-minute recording of Dvorak’s “Symphony No. 9, From the New World.“

This could be used with all age groups.

Find the audio by clicking the daily Prompt links under "How To Do It"

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Teachers who work with traumatized students may suffer from chronic stress and vicarious trauma-without even realizing it. Here are some things school leaders can do to help them.

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Mindful Music Moments | Greater Good In Education

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Each day for a week, the entire school (or classroom) mindfully listens to a 4-minute recording of Dvorak's "Symphony No. 9, From the New World".

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Students dance to music and freeze when it stops, displaying a particular emotion.

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Freeze Feelings: An SEL Kernels Brain Game | Greater Good In Education