Boosting Concentration Through Play: 10 Activity Games Every Teacher Should Know

In classrooms around the world, teachers are searching for effective, engaging ways to help children focus, learn, and grow. Whether you're teaching in a bustling urban school or a small rural classroom, one challenge remains universal: how to enhance student concentration and engagement—especially among young learners.

Recent research published in the American Journal of Pedagogical and Educational Research (Vol. 3, Aug 2022) by Firuza Abdulhairova offers valuable insights into this question. The study highlights ten structured activity games that significantly improve concentration, motivation, and long-term memory retention—particularly when teaching foreign languages or other cognitively demanding subjects.

At Baumgarten Child Psychology and More, we believe in merging psychological science with practical strategiesfor educators. Below, we summarize the key findings of the article and explore how international teachers can apply them in their classrooms.

Why Activity Games Work

The research emphasizes what developmental psychologists have long understood: children learn best when they're actively engaged. Activity games promote:

• Cognitive engagement: stimulating attention and working memory

• Physical movement: supporting executive functioning and self-regulation

• Language development: increasing verbal fluency and vocabulary retention

• Social-emotional learning: building communication, empathy, and confidence

Even more compelling: Abdulhairova’s small-scale study in Uzbekistan found that children who learned a foreign language through activity games performed significantly better in psychological interviews compared to peers taught through traditional methods.

10 Teacher-Tested Activity Games to Try

Here are ten adaptable games from the study—tested with children aged 4–7 but easily scalable for broader age groups and classroom settings.

1. Who Can Guess Faster?

A dynamic relay game combining concentration, vocabulary recall, and causal thinking. Use numbers, colors, or images depending on the subject. Great for practicing foreign language words in a fast-paced format.

Tip for teachers: Try this with country flags, animals, or verbs in your target language.

2. Defining the Topic of the Lesson

Children observe a mix of objects related to the lesson's theme. After some movement and music, they guess the day’s topic.

Why it works: Builds critical thinking and primes students for inquiry-based learning.

3. Mental Agility Game

Children react physically (clap, stand, jump) depending on the category of the word they hear—food, toy, or sky object.

Foreign language bonus: Use vocabulary in your target language to reinforce understanding through kinesthetic action.

4. Pantomime Expressing Emotions

Children act out emotions like anger, surprise, or joy.

Educational value: Boosts creative thinking, emotional literacy, and expressive vocabulary.

5. Passing the Ball

Using only their legs, children pass a ball around while asking and answering questions.

Classroom use: A fantastic way to break the ice, reinforce sentence structure, and improve listening skills.

6. Happy Cubes

Children roll dice to determine actions to perform (e.g., "to swim") and brainstorm who or what can do that action.

Skill development: Links visual cues, language, and physical expression—ideal for young language learners.

7. Colorful Mental Maps

During a nature walk, students observe and later recall the colors and objects they saw.

What it improves: Enhances observation skills, visual memory, and descriptive language.

8. What Do I Have in My Hand?

A guessing game using mystery objects where students ask and answer questions to discover the item.

Pro tip: Encourage open-ended questions to develop deductive reasoning and speech.

9. Thinking with the Help of Shapes

Children create drawings by connecting dots into shapes, then explain their drawing.

Language benefit: Integrates geometry, visual thinking, and oral expression.

10. Skilful Sewers

Students cut newspapers into strips and creatively brainstorm what can be made with them.

Classroom impact: Supports fine motor skills, creative problem-solving, and language production.

Evidence-Based Outcomes

Abdulhairova’s study not only documents these games, but also shows that they:

• Strengthen neural connections vital to memory and attention

• Improve academic performance, especially in foreign language acquisition

• Boost confidence, particularly in children who might struggle in traditional classroom settings

Importantly, children exposed to these games regularly outperformed peers who experienced passive, non-interactive instruction—both in concentration tests and psychological assessments.

How International Teachers Can Implement These Games

Whether you're teaching in English, French, German, Spanish, or another language, these activity games can be adapted to fit your curriculum:

✅ Use multilingual vocabulary for game prompts

✅ Includecultural elements(e.g., festivals, foods, landmarks)

✅ Adjust rules based onclass size, age, oravailable materials

✅ Integrate games duringtransitions,warm-ups, orreview sessions

Final Thoughts from Baumgarten

At Baumgarten Child Psychology and More, we support global educators in integrating psychological science into everyday teaching. Activity-based learning isn't just a trend—it’s a neurodevelopmentally sound approach to enhancing focus, learning, and emotional well-being.

We strongly encourage educators to begin implementing these games from the earliest ages, as the benefits multiply over time—not just in language acquisition, but across all areas of development.

Let’s teach smarter, play more, and help every child thrive.

📖 Reference:

Firuza Abdulhairova.Ten Activity Games to Raise the Concentration of Children.American Journal of Pedagogical and Educational Research, Vol. 3, Aug 2022.www.americanjournal.org

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