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Comment by dllthomas | Hacker News Reader

As a youth, I was only able to sit still by focusing on sitting still. If I was paying attention to the teacher, I was fidgeting, and would be told to pay attention...

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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.

My 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.

Maybe 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?

I 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.

But if you sit that same twitchy kid in front of a video game or stimulating TV show, the fidgeting doesn't happen. Interesting...

I recall being teased for moving around while playing video games...

I 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.

My son gets to do his tests on a yoga ball, and it works very well.

Well done Sir.

There has been research on this with adults.

People who fidget in meetings pay attention better and retain more information.

Even as an adult, when I'm really focused on something my right leg gets a mind of its own and just starts bouncing up and down rapidly. Maybe there's an evolutionary purpose to it (increasing blood circulation perhaps), but I've always found that when I force myself to be perfectly still I just don't focus as well.

Same here, I was constantly told to pay attention or my progress reports would say, "does well but does not pay attention".

I still do this at 26.

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