AULAS FELICES: Activities to lower anxiety & for strategic investment

AULAS FELICES: Activities to lower anxiety & for strategic investment

As teachers, we should make sure that our students feel comfortable in the classroom atmosphere. It is a normal fact in teenagers to be overwhelmed or stressed because of the amount of work students have or because their personal situations promote this state of mind. The emotional state of our students will affect the way in which the lesson is developed and the amount of information they actually learn. The following activities can serve for the purpose of relaxing our students and creating a cool atmosphere in the classroom. 

Activity 1

We can devote the first ten minutes of our lesson to do a relaxation activity. Since for this activity mats will be needed, the ideal would be to ask students to go to the gym facilities in the high school or to bring individual mats into the classroom and put them on the tables. 

First of all, we need to pre-teach them how to breathe correctly. Once each student has learnt how to do it, has its own mat and is lent down on it, the teacher will play some kind of music that is relaxing (classic music, natural effects such as the sea or the rain…). Then, the instructor will act as the guide of this activity, since he or she will need to, in a sweet voice, tell them to close their eyes and that a given part of their bodies is heavier and heavier step by step. It is advisable to begin from the foot and finish with the head.

If students are focused on this activity, they will feel how their bodies get calmer and calmer and they will reach a state of serenity and peace that will allow them to be attentive to the lesson. 

Activity 2 

Since one of the skills promoted in Aulas Felices is social intelligence, we could end our session by opening a debate on a relevant and current topic. Students have to express their ideas and defend them with arguments that can convince the rest of the pupils that have different or opposite ideas. This can be also done but taking into account daily situations that can lead to conflict and collect opinions and ideas of how to solve it with peaceful techniques. 

In this way, students will be developing their critical thinking and their ability to make decisions on a topic.

Activity 3 

Moral values are also relevant for this approach of teaching and learning. Therefore, a good activity for working their now views on themselves and how humble they are, our students can reflect on themselves and their strong and weak points. They would be asked to write those characteristics in a sheet of paper, divided into two columns. Afterwards, they should swap them with one peer and comment whether the comments are true or false. 

To conclude, a general opinion would be created by reflecting in group, the whole class should get involved and participate so that they can judge (in a respectful way) human behavior and specially the conception each of us has of ourselves.