Attempting to Give a Brain Break

High school kids don't love to buy into new things. When I told them to take out a pencil at the end of our lesson on progressivism and workers' rights at the turn of the 20th century, they thought it would be a quiz or something academic. When I gave them instructions to make a dot then a winding line, some of them literally drew one centimeter out then back in again. Others drew a huge swooping line, others asked for more clarification in direction.."can we pick our pencils up?" "does it have to be straight?" These students are so structured and rigid with academics that I wanted to give them as little instruction as I could. When I told them to draw over their line, the student with the one centimeter line went "1-2 done done". I was mildly annoyed, but this definitely fits this students' personality. I noticed the females were much quieter and took the activity more seriously than the males. I did the activity with them so I tried to model the behavior, but I was distracted by all of their questions! Next time I would tell them this is a brain break and time for quiet.

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