Mindfulness In the Classroom

This week, I thought I would switch it up and look into mindfulness in the classroom. A few of you have expressed interest in this specific topic. While scrolling through the UofR online library, I came across an intriguing article examining the benefits of Mindfulness vs. Relaxation Training for third graders’ executive functions and literacy… yeah… I made it halfway through and then lost interest. Instead, I found myself thinking, why the heck would I voluntarily choose to read an article when most university professors assign boat loads of articles to read weekly… lol. I ended up switching to a shorter article to examine.

The article focused on the following question:

Do SBMPs impact student outcomes in preschool, primary school, and secondary school settings?

Interestingly, the article says that School-based mindfulness programs (SPMPs) have become increasingly popular in the last 15 years. It also mentions how the introduction of SBMPs has outpaced the research evaluating their implementation and impacts. This stood out to me because I expected to read an article that praised mindfulness and had only positive benefits to discuss. Not that this article was talking down about mindfulness practices; it just touched on essential aspects that need to be considered when implementing.

For one, the authors stated that more research is needed to know which practice method is most effective for which kinds of outcomes, for which students, and at which ages. In complete honesty, that thought has not come to my mind when thinking about implementing mindfulness into my future classroom. I feel like mindfulness is another buzzing topic being implemented in classrooms, which is excellent. Still, it makes me wonder how much thought is being put into the desired outcomes and individual student needs/preferences. One of the biggest things I have learned through this mindfulness journey is that the journey looks different for everyone, and what works for one person might not work for another. To emphasize this, the authors mentioned that assessing student perspectives on SBMPs and their motivation to engage with such programs and practices seems critical in future research. This makes a lot of sense. Especially when I compare it to having a difficult child in the classroom. To effectively manage or work with a difficult child, you must first form a relationship with the child and know what motivates them. For example, suppose you are trying to reward a child for behaving appropriately by rewarding them with stickers, but they don’t care about stickers. Instead, they care about peer approval or praise; the stickers won’t motivate them to behave appropriately. Having them work towards something that benefits the whole class or earning time to work with a peer would work better, as that is what motivates them. You are teaching the student, not the problem. The same applies to implementing mindfulness programs or practices. Each student needs to be considered.

Honestly, this article has got me thinking a lot about how I would approach mindfulness in my future classroom. It has shifted my perspective and reminded me of the purpose of knowing the why behind doing things. Don’t get me wrong I still think without a doubt that implementing mindfulness practices in the classroom has tons of benefits. I will just think about implementing it a little differently now.

The image below provides some great tips for implementing mindfulness in the classroom.

I plan to explore this topic further, as this article has given me a lot to think about!! For those of you who have your own classroom, do you implement mindfulness? If so, what has worked for you and your students? And what has not worked? I would love to hear from all my fellow teachers!