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They gave me silly putty to harness my fidgeting. I soon discovered silly putty can be made into a bouncy ball, that I could use to distract everyone.
by ImprovedSilence 13y ago
They gave me silly putty to harness my fidgeting. I soon discovered silly putty can be made into a bouncy ball, that I could use to distract everyone.
- joezydeco 13y agoMy son's classroom has employed smaller versions of exercise balls to keep some of the kids focused (including my own). It's interesting to observe. The kids are fidgety and restless while sitting, but when you sit them on one of these the subconscious motor control going on seems to quell the foreground restlessness.
- sp332 13y agoMaybe it's a metabolism thing? If they're used to burning calories a a certain rate, homeostasis will cause their bodies to seek to maintain that rate. Fidgeting burns a lot of calories. Maybe tensing up core muscles for balance fills that need?
- wes-exp 13y agoI seem to recall studies in controlled environments where people were not allowed to exercise, and there was a significant difference in calorie burn attributable to small movements. So the homeostasis argument seems totally plausible to me.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- joezydeco 13y agoI think it's more about the level of background "noise" in the brains of young kids. When unchecked/unfiltered in some kids it will start to trickle into the motor/cognitive areas of the brain and that's how you get fidgeting, twitchiness, those kinds of things. Balancing on an exercise ball seems to engage those involuntary areas while not interfering with high-level processing.
- dgabriel 13y agoMy son gets to do his tests on a yoga ball, and it works very well.
- mehmehshoe 13y agoWell done Sir.