This post is part of the 2019 Homeschooling Through the Holiday series and was written by series sponsor, Yellow Wood Success Academy!
Christmas Themed Brain Games…
That the whole family can enjoy!
Hi there! This is Laurie Geary from Yellow Wood Success Academy, and I’m thrilled to share with you some Christmas-Themed Brain Games! At Yellow Wood, we specialize in helping unique learners gain skills and confidence through target brain games and exercises. We strive to make it a truly enjoyable experience to strengthen the brain and overcome challenges.
Before we dive into games, let’s talk a little about brain training. At Yellow Wood, we call it “Success Training”. We use specific games and activities to build skills like memory, attention, processing, and more! If your child is struggling with reading, math, staying focused, or following directions, then Success Training might be a great fit for your child!
Echo Echo Christmas Edition
Let’s talk about working memory for a minute. This skill works like the post-it in your brain! So, when working to strengthen this skill, we want to increase the amount of information that can be put on the post-it. You can read more about what exactly Working Memory is and how it affects learning by reading my blog post, “Show Your Smarts with Working Memory”.
To improve auditory working memory, you can play a little game I like to call “echo echo”. To play, you’ll list 3-6 items. For example, “elf, Christmas tree, star, ornament, santa”. Then your child will repeat them back to you! To make this more difficult, have them repeat them BACKWARDS, “santa, ornament, star, christmas tree, elf”.
This can be quite an entertaining game to play at the dinner table. See who’s the best at this challenge. You might find that even you as parents have a hard time with this!
Does your child struggle with this activity? Practicing for a few minutes every day will improve verbal working memory. Strengthening this skill will carry over into academics and home life as well!
I Picture You…. Christmas Edition
Another great game for improving working memory is kind of like hide and seek! Choose or hide 4-5 items around the house, preferably Christmas related items! Then list 3-6 items, like this: “I picture you finding a santa hat, reindeer, ornament, tinsel, and star”.
Your student should then repeat, “I picture myself finding a santa hat, reindeer, ornament, tinsel, and star” – then work to find those items! How does this help working memory? It requires them to keep that list on the post it in their brain (working memory), long enough to find all the objects! You can make the list longer or add distractions as they become more confident with this task!
List it Christmas Edition
Another type of memory, one we are all a bit more familiar with, is long term memory. I like to think of long term memory as your library. You file things away, and you need to be able to recall them whenever you need them. You can read up on how exactly long term memory works and how it can affect learning if its weak by reading my blog post, “4 Reasons Why Your Child May be Struggling with Long Term Memory”.
Another fun Christmas challenge is to see how many Christmas related items your child can list in one minute. This game stretches their long term memory recall skills. So, set a timer for one minute, and mark a tally for every christmas themed item they can think of!
If they get less than 30 items, their long term memory recall may need a boost! Practicing this every day for 30 days will help improve their recall, which can make test taking and memorization easier!
Curious what other games you can play with your child to improve skills like attention, processing, and comprehension? Right now at Yellow Wood, our newest product, the SensoryBrain Box, is available! The cart will close on December 31st, and won’t open again until March 2020!
What is the SensoryBrain Box? The sensory Brain box equips you with the strategies and tools to find your child’s path to success with our proven Success Training methods!
Each month we will send you a variety of our tried and true brain training games, exercises, and sensory toys to strengthen your child’s brain skills. You will have access to all the instructions and exclusive strategies that we use daily at Yellow Wood Success Academy. Brain training success delivered right to your doorstep!
When You purchase the SensoryBrain Box, you’ll also receive our Christmas Morning Games pack, absolutely free! This printable games pack is the perfect way to let your child know that you’ve purchased the SensoryBrain Box for Christmas! Though the box won’t ship til January 15th, this printable games pack is Christmas themes and a perfect stocking stuffer! Also included is a card explaining that their SensoryBrain Box will arrive soon!
What’s inside?
3 Printable games that you can only get from Yellow Wood! These games are Christmas themed and perfect for family fun on Christmas day!
You’ll all get a printable card that tells your kiddo all about the SensoryBrain Box that will be arriving in January!
Would you LOVE a SensoryBrain Box? You can enter to win by clicking below! The winner will receive a 6 month subscription (worth $359!!) for FREE!
Leave a Reply