Emotion Regulation for Adolescents
Yoga and Mindfulness
in the Classroom
Yoga and Mindfulness
in the Classroom
This website is designed to be a tool to help teachers, administrators, counselors, and anyone who works with adolescents. We want you to feel comfortable using yoga as a method to foster emotional regulation skills in our youth and in ourselves. Often times we think about yoga as stretching, physical movement, maybe breathing...but yoga encompasses so much more. Yoga is about understanding one's self and how we interact in the world. It is about living a more centered and balanced life.
Yoga philosophy aligns to our modern day concepts of social and emotional learning. I have researched studies across the world to see how implementing yoga and mindfulness practices in school helped adolescents strengthen emotional regulation skills. In this journey I have fallen more deeply in love with both yoga and SEL. I am even more passionate about the need to cultivate these life skills in ourselves and every generation that succeeds us.
Social and emotional learning (SEL) is the foundation for which all other learning happens. The Collaborative for Academics, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL) defines SEL as "the process through which learners acquire and effectively apply the knowledge, attitudes, and skills necessary to understand and manage emotions, set and achieve positive goals, feel and show empathy for others, establish and maintain positive relationships, and make responsible decisions." They have categorized five core competencies for SEL.:
Self-awareness is how we think about ourselves and who we are. This includes understanding our culture, thoughts, feelings, and how we fit in to society. It includes an understanding of how these things can influence our behavior and beliefs.
Self-management is the ability to manage our emotions and thoughts to help us achieve individual and collective goals. This includes knowing and using coping skills that help us work through stress and anxiety and persevere through challenges.
Social awareness is how we perceive and understand others. It includes empathy and insight into other’s feelings, wants, and needs. It is an understanding of a community’s social norms that help us find a sense of belonging.
Relationship skills help us make and maintain meaningful relationships with others. It includes the ability to effectively communicate and work together to solve problems and manage conflict. It also includes an ability to advocate for ourselves and others.
Responsible decision making utilizes all of these skills together to make caring and just choices that are in the best interest of ourselves and the community. It includes the ability to think critically about the consequences of our own behavior, including the impact on ourselves and others, and identify solutions that support our collective well-being.
Self-management includes the ability to regulate one's own emotions. It involves being aware of one’s feelings and the ability to use this awareness as information to manage and adjust one’s emotional state. Emotional regulation has been identified as a key factor in determining mental health, specifically against the development of depression.
Adolescence is a particularly important time in emotional regulatory learning. Youth are faced with social demands and academic expectations. It is a time of immense biological and physical changes, including hormonal increases that play a role in emotions. Structural development happens in the brain during this time that effects both the limbic system and the pre-frontal cortex. These are key parts of the brain that are responsible for emotional regulation. The brain understands this as a time to take risks and is hard wired to be open to new experiences.
While this can be a challenging time to help learners work through big emotions, it can also be a critical and especially important time to focus on emotional regulation skills. It is advantageous to recognize this time when learners are affirming their identity and help them discover powerful coping tools that will impact the way they navigate the world, not only today, but for the rest of their lives.
Yoga is not a new practice. It has been an organic evolution of studies and practices dating back more than 5,000 years. This practice focuses on a mind-body connection through movement and breath-work. Yoga goes far beyond the physical aspects of its practice. Yoga provides guidance on how we function in a community, how we show kindness to others, and how we move through our day with freedom from pain and suffering. At its root, the main goal of yoga is to achieve self-awareness while navigating external experiences in our environment.
Yoga teaches us self-awareness by noticing what is happening in our bodies. It fosters self-management by understanding how to practice pausing before reacting, sitting with uncomfortable feelings, and responding with non-violence. Through the principles of yoga, we learn social awareness and relationship skills by understanding compassion and empathy. Yoga teaches us responsible decision making by being in service to others and understanding our connection to the world. Yoga teaches us resilience and gives us tools to cope, self soothe, and understand perspective. The philosophy of yoga provides guidelines that serve as a road map to develop and foster key social and emotional skills.
There is a large body of evidence that shows efficacy in adolescent development of emotional regulation skills through the practice of yoga, specifically when implemented into the classroom environment.
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