Are you having a ball in class?

Do you teach a class or lab where student get a break?  I have found that very few students interacted with each other during break.  Instead I observed most were checking their phones or texting.  I wanted to encourage more interaction between classmates and less phone and computer time.  So I decided to bring in 3 cloth “soft” footballs for the students to toss to each other.  I announced to students that they could toss balls to each other only during break and only in my classroom.  After a week, most students were tossing the balls to each other and even some students were coming to class early just to “play catch”.  I have recently added an indoor corn toss game which is also very popular. As a result I have seen increased interaction between students and they seem more motivated to come to class and participate.