Christmas Brain Breaks for a Holiday Attention Boost!

In the weeks leading up to Christmas, we teachers often notice a delightful but undeniable shift in our students’ attention spans. The anticipation and excitement of the holiday season create a notable challenge for maintaining focus in the classroom. As we get closer to the holidays, it becomes more common for kids to find their thoughts wandering to festive decorations, gift wish lists, and plans for holiday fun. What are we to do? We’ve still got a curriculum to teach!

Helping Students Focus with Brain Breaks for Kids!

One way to help steer your students’ wandering imaginations back into the classroom is by giving them opportunities to get up, move, have fun, and give their brains a break! That’s where Teach Starter comes in!

This year, we’ve put together the perfect resource to blend your students’ Santa-stuffed imaginations with movement, drama, and other activities to help them release some pent-up energy and refocus on the tasks at hand. This Google Slides resource provides you (and your students) with 18 Exciting Christmas Brain Break activities to try out in your classroom this year.

Some brain breaks include

• Santa’s Breathing – Calming & Meditative Breathing Exercise
• Gingerbread Run – Movement Activity
• Icicle Freeze Dance – Music appreciation, dance, and listening skills activity
• And more!

Using Your Christmas Brain Break Activities for Kids in the Classroom

This slide deck has several types of activities, so here’s a quick rundown of each.

• Breathing Break Slides: Project the slide and read aloud the instructions to guide students through relaxing breathing breaks
• Act it Out! Project the slide, read the instructions aloud to the students, and engage them in a fun movement activity.
• Freeze Dance Game: Project this slide whenever you want to engage students in a fun Christmas-themed freeze dance game. Play any Christmas song (engage students to request or vote on a song if you’re going to involve the class) and occasionally pause the music and remind them to freeze.
• Christmas Four Corners: Label or announce the four corners in the classroom. Remind students we will walk to each corner and watch where we are going. Read each option and tell students to pick one. Then, students will be allowed to move to the corner they chose.

This resource is available as an editable Google Slides resource. Should you need to make a change, use the Google Slides menu to go up to Slide, then select Edit Theme. This will take you to the Google Slides theme builder, where you can make any necessary changes. Click the download button to download your file today!

Grab Even More Holiday Brain Breaks!

Add even more Christmas spirit to the classroom with these winter brain break activities.

teaching resource

Christmas Trivia Advent Calendar Interactive

Host a Christmas trivia game show with an interactive advent calendar trivia game.

teaching resource

Christmas Collaborative Art Project - Coloring Mural

Create a beautiful whole class holiday bulletin board with this collaborative Christmas-themed classroom mural.

teaching resource

Christmas Jokes | Classroom Elf Joke Cards

Print a set of fun joke cards for your classroom elf and students to enjoy this Christmas.