The Big Test: How We Experience Short-Term Stress

Description:
In this activity, teachers will induce mild stress in students by announcing they are about to have a quiz that will be a major part of their grade. Once students learn that this is not true, they will describe their physical and mental changes in response to this stress.

Objectives:
Students will:

• Experience and describe a situation of short-term stress
• Record and analyze their physical and mental reactions to the stressful situation
• Make generalizations about how humans react to short-term stress, including that different people respond to stress in different ways

Relevant Standards:
This activity fulfills science and health education standards.

BAM! Body and Mind Resources:

• Feelin' Frazzled...? — 10 suggestions for relieving short-term stress.
• Got Butterflies? Find Out Why. — An interactive feature that teaches what short-term and long-term stress do to the body and how to cope with them.