Mindfulness is awareness that arises through paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, non-judgementally,” says Jon Kabat-Zinn. “And then I sometimes add, in the service of self-understanding and wisdom.”
The practice of mindfulness helps us center our awareness of our self and others. It connects us to our own thoughts and sensations, so that we can pause before we respond to stimuli. It sharpens our focus and allows us to concentrate on tasks, better retain information, and strengthen the mind-body connection.
Every exercise that you will find on the pages of this website are designed to practice and increase mindfulness.
Below are just a few.
Turn your awareness to your breath. Allow all other thoughts to rest for just this moment. Give yourself permission to be in this moment, fully.
Purposefully watch your breath, following it's path through the body, from the time it enters into the nostrils, down the throat, into the heart space, into the belly, and then all the way back out again.
Take time to notice each of these spaces within the body.
Take time to notice the sensation of the breath. Notice the texture of the breath. The quality of the breath.
Try to follow the path of the breath for one full minute.
When other thoughts start to arise in the mind, notice that they are there and let them go. With practice, fewer thoughts will try to pop up during this time and/or you will be more aware of when those thoughts try to take over the mind space.
See also: [Link to Breathing Page]
Hand every student a rock (or any object from nature- flower, blade of grass, leaf, twig).
Invite them to focus on their object. Let them know you will set a timer for 2 minutes. Explore the object as if they have never seen one before (we call this using a beginner's mind)
Questions to consider:
What is the color of the object?
What is it's texture?
Is the object smooth, rough, cold, warm?
Notice every detail of the object.
If other thoughts start to come into focus, encourage to students to be aware that these thoughts have entered the mind and to non-judgmentally allow them to fade.
This exercise is designed to strengthen the awareness of every day routine activities. When students are getting settled into their seats and opening up their laptops, have them move through the process with intention.
Prompt them to become aware of the chair beneath them and notice the sensation of their feet pressing (or resting) on the floor.
Notice the sound of the laptop opening. Take pause to appreciate the hands that enable this process. Notice the temperature of the keys as they rest their fingers on them.
By noticing the details of routine actions, we pull ourselves away from moving on auto-pilot. This helps us stay in the moment and tune in to our own thoughts, feelings, and actions.
Encourage students to practice this the next time they open up their locker. Or climb the steps onto the bus.
Mindful awareness is not limited to only physical actions. We can learn to become aware of negative thinking. We can choose to take that moment to pause, label the thought as unhelpful, and look for a solution. We can use our awareness to label emotions we are experiencing and plan our next course of action based on what we know about coping strategies. Mindful awareness gives us the gift of slowing down to recognize things we appreciate and to also detect warning signs before we might otherwise react negatively.
This exercise helps learners observe things without attachment, by listening to sounds in a non-judgmental way. Much of what we feel is attached to a previous experience. Songs might remind us of a good or bad experience or we might immediately categorize a genre into what we like and don't like. This activity helps us learn to approach situations without being attached to a predetermined outcome.
Choose a song that you think students have not hear before but is not within the "popular" genre that most of them are listening to.
Prompt them to listen to the song with neutrality and without judgement. Notice the instruments, the composition, the rhythm of the piece without labeling it something they "like" or "dislike".
Invite them to close their eyes and allow themselves to be fully immersed in the experience. They might choose to separate each instrument in their mind or pull apart each voice.
The goal is to simply hear the sounds without labeling or judging them.
This exercise gives learners the opportunity to find appreciation in things (or people) that they would otherwise not notice. At the beginning of class, provide them with a sheet of paper (or have them pull out one from a notebook) that has FIVE boxes. Ask them to notice five different moments throughout the time together in class that they appreciate. Things that they would not ordinarily take time to appreciate.
Encourage them to be authentic in their findings. Each time they notice something, have them write, or draw it, in one of the boxes.
This can become a routine and students may choose to have a notebook dedicated solely to their appreciations.
Exercises inspired by www.beewell-living.com
Find mindful movement strategies here.
In A Review of Classroom-Based SEL Programs at the Middle School Level, (Durlak et al., 2015) cites a study of the MindUp Curriculum, designed as a 10 lesson mindfulness program, delivered once a week for 40-50 minutes each, over a 3 month period. The curriculum targets four key program goals; quieting the mind, developing mindful attention, managing negative thoughts and feelings, and acknowledging self and others. In this quasi-experimental review, results indicated that participants, sixth and seventh grade students, self-reported greater optimism at the post test. Classroom teachers reported observed improvement in attentiveness, greater emotional regulation, and higher levels of social and emotional competence, compared to peers in the control group (Durlak et al., 2015). Mindfulness, cites the article, is defined as “bringing one’s complete attention to the present experience on a moment to moment basis with a non-judgmental stance.”
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