Dr. Pamela Cantor: One of the most challenging things for children to do is to bring themselves into a state of calm. Mindfulness contributes to a child’s ability to self-regulate and bring themselves into a calm state for learning.

Lindsey Minder: When students come from the dining hall after lunch, we do a very short guided mindfulness practice. We’re ready to transition from the energy of lunch into a different kind of energy for our humanities. It’s a way for students to sort of recenter themselves, check in with their brains and their hearts and their bodies, and see where they’re at.

Alright, kiddos. We’re going to get started. Taking a big breath in. And letting it out with a little noise.

I always start with a couple kind of big breaths.

Another big one in.

Here at our school, we’re really aware of the vast variety of needs that students can have, whether they’re academic needs, social needs, emotional needs, behavioral needs, or physical needs.

Our eyes are going closed. If that doesn’t feel good, we’re looking down. We’re covering our eyes.

I never require kids to close their eyes, because that can feel really unsettling. We talk about looking into the palms of their hands or they’re looking into the seam on their sneakers, whatever works for them.

We are here. We are safe.

I have a few students who can sit cross-legged for an hour on end, it would be totally fine. I have other kids that, for their bodies, that’s incredibly challenging. So being seated in a chair or at a wall, so they have something to lean into, is really helpful. The kids who had stuffed animals needed those, either for sort of like a sensory tactile input or a soothing comfort sort of input. So there’s no judgment around it, but there’s a level of awareness so they can do what they need to do.

Three, two, one.

And then, I always count down at the end.

Bring yourself back to this room. Eyes open. Eyes open.

A few kids will fall asleep, and they need to be woken up.

All right. Silent hands for shares.

I do like to build in reflections as often as possible.

Student: When I was in the dining hall, my heart was going beep, beep, beep, beep.

Student: But now, when we did mindfulness, my heart feels so nice and calm.

Ashmodel: We do mindfulness because– tell them.

Ayne: We do mindfulness because during lunch, it gets a little crazy. And so, when we go upstairs, we calm down so we can transfer to writing.

Dr. Pamela Cantor: Very often, practices like mindfulness enable children to get that inner calm again after they’ve had a stressful experience in a classroom, in a lunchroom, in the hallway.

Lindsey Minder: Who can tell me what it means for a text to be a fiction text?

Student: Fiction is when it’s not real and non-fiction is when it is real.

Lindsey Minder: Nice. The impact of the mindfulness practice is really this general sense of them being more comfortable and confident with themselves and they’re varying needs and decreases in anxiety around academic work.

Double kiss for your brain. Amazing job.

六合彩彩票

Codman Academy Charter Public School