This post will help you give your students' brains the best chance of successful functioning during testing! David A. Sousa outlines these steps in his book, "How the Brain Learns" which I HIGHLY recommend.
First Sousa explains there are two things brain cells consume as fuel...oxygen and glucose. These steps help make more of both of those things available for the brain during stressful test taking.
1) Quick exercise: Get your students up for about two minutes of jumping jacks or calf raises before they start the test. These movements will increase blood flood and move more oxygen up to the brain.
Everyone loves a visual! : )
2) Eat some fruit: It is an excellent source of glucose and will give those brain cells some energy! Glucose helps increase recall from both long-term memory and working memory significantly. Obviously this is very important for success on a test! Sousa suggests raisins for convenience in the classroom, but other fruit work too. However, fruit juices don't quite have the same effect. They have more fructose than glucose, so bypass those.
Mmm...mmm...my brain is working better already!
3) Wash that fruit down with some water. This is key because water will help the glucose get into students' bloodstream faster. We want hydrated brains!
Do these steps with about 5 minutes until testing...and you should be good to go for about a 30 minute test. If you're giving a longer test than that, take a break and have your kids repeat the steps.
Well there you have it..."How the Brain Learns" by David A. Sousa...I'm telling you, it's some good stuff! Buy it for your professional library!
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