Incorporating Physical Activity Bursts into the Classroom

Guest Blog Post by Erika Nelson-Wong, PT, DPT, PhD
Associate Professor, School of Physical Therapy

MSU-Denver
Teacher-Scholar Forum
March 14, 2014

Incorporating Physical Activity Bursts into the Classroom

Presented by: Michelle Tollefson, MD, Carol Jensen, RN, MEd. and Emily Matuszewicz, DC

Engaging Learners: 21st Century Pedagogies

Do you find your students are nodding off by the end of class or seem to be lacking in energy/enthusiasm? Are they stressed or overwhelmed? This session, presented at the MSU-Denver Teacher-Scholar Forum, offered some strong evidence for the benefits of including movement and mindfulness activities during classroom sessions.

I won’t go into the complete neurophysiology (it is out there for those who wish to read about it in more depth), but several studies have shown that acute bouts of exercise (even very short activity bursts) result in increased concentration, attention, ability to filter out distractions, and elevated activity in critical parts of the brain for learning and memory formation. Benefits of chronic exercise include increased learning potential, elevated BDNF (a neurotransmitter in the brain that is associated with learning), higher levels of reasoning ability, better formation of long term memories, as well as things we usually associate with exercise such as improved motivation and mood. One exciting thing is that these benefits can be achieved with only a few minutes of activity – or short exercise bursts.

These are all things that we would like to see in our students, right? What if we could draw on the power of movement/exercise by including it in our classroom activities?

Seven ideas were presented for how to include movement in the classroom setting, I will briefly describe these here and add some of my own reflections:

•  Utilize Your Students – have students rotate through leading a brief (2-3 minute) activity in class. Many students have formal movement training (certified yoga instructors or personal trainers) – and it helps students to take ownership and learn to instruct others.

• Do Something Silly and Novel – Look up ‘Multiple Player Massive Thumb Wrestling http://www.ted.com/talks/jane_mcgonigal_massively_multi_player_thumb_wrestlingas an example of a silly, fun, physically and mentally challenging activity that takes very little time. In the session we also did a 4 minute exercise program from the Activity Bursts Everywhere website http://www.abeforfitness.com/that was comprehensive, funny and worked pretty much every part of the body with exercises designed to be performed at a desk (not such a bad idea for us desk workers either!)

• Involve Multiple Senses – difficult concepts can be made more meaningful, and deeper memories can be formed, if multisensory systems are included. One suggestion was to have students close their ideas and imagine points on a power point slide while manipulating an object that gets passed around the class. Research linking the sense of smell to memory was also presented.
  
  
• Cross the Midline – throw a beanbag from hand to hand while summarizing an important concept just covered in class, then pass it along to another student to summarize the next concept.
  
  
• Get the Head Below the Heart – this is good for relaxation and calming stress. Have students lower their head below their hearts by bending forward in sitting or standing, relaxing the neck muscles by nodding yes and no, then returning to upright one vertebra at a time.
  
  
• Guided Meditation – the presenters said their students frequently mention this one as a class favorite. Take a couple of minutes at the start of class to practice deep breathing exercises and try to calm inner mental chatter as preparation for learning or exams.
  
  
• Make Activities Relevant to Curriculum – connect to what you are teaching as much as possible. If you are teaching a lesson in chemistry, have students close their eyes and visualize a chemical reaction. Pass around an object that is representative of a historical figure while discussing content related to that place/person/event.

As someone who teaches in the physical therapy and exercise science curricula, these ideas resonated with me and I realized I was already using some of them to demonstrate concepts in class. Since attending the workshop I have been more intentional with it – even to the point of having students simply stand up and do 10 jumping jacks (being mindful not to hit each other with flying arms and legs!) as fast as possible when I sense them starting to fade. Students enjoy it, and the energy in the classroom is always improved following some activity.

I hope you now have some ideas for incorporating physical movement in your classes as the benefits are real and immediate!

Erika Nelson-Wong, PT, DPT, PhD
Associate Professor, School of Physical Therapy