In today's schools, students and teachers feel unprecedented--even alarming--levels of stress. How can we create calmer classrooms in which students concentrate better and feel more positive about themselves and others? Author Thomas Armstrong offers a compelling answer in the form of mindfulness, a secular practice he defines as the intentional focus of one's attention on the present moment in a nonjudgmental way.
An epidemic is sweeping through our classrooms today. Not connected to a virus, bacteria, or any other pathogen, the malady is stress. Our students are experiencing stress at levels never before seen in the history of U.S. education. The statistics are alarming. Here are a few of them:
– One in 10 preschoolers has had suicidal thoughts (Whalen, Dixon-Gordon, Belden, Barch, & Luby, 2015)
– Doctors are increasingly reporting children in early elementary school suffering from migraine headaches and ulcers, and many physicians see a clear connection to pressure related to school performance (Abeles, 2016).-
– A third of our adolescents report feeling depressed or overwhelmed because of stress, and their single biggest source of stress is school (American Psychological Association, 2014).
– Roughly 1 in 4 girls and 1 in 10 boys in U.S. high schools try to harm themselves even when they are not attempting suicide (Monto, McRee, & Deryck, 2018).
– In a Yale University survey of more than 22,000 high school students, teens reported feeling stressed 80 percent of the time in school (Brackett, 2016).
– By age 21, according to one longitudinal study, 82.5 percent of our students will have met the criteria for at least one psychiatric disorder (Copeland, Shanahan, Costello, & Angold, 2011). (No, this is not a misprint.)
In Mindfulness in the Classroom, Dr. Armstrong:
– Discusses how mindfulness practices in the classroom can help significantly reduce stress levels in students.
– Explains how mindfulness affects the structure and function of the brain.
– Provides an overview of mindfulness as both a personal practice and a classroom methodology that aligns with such educational models as Social and Emotional Learning (SEL), Positive Behavioral Intervention and Supports (PBIS), and Universal Design for Learning (UDL).
– Shares and explains the extensive research that shows the positive effects of mindfulness practices in the classroom.
– Describes how to adapt mindfulness for different grade levels, integrate it into regular school subjects, and implement it schoolwide.
– Offers guidelines for teaching mindfulness responsibly, without religious overtones.
Dozens of observations from teachers, students, researchers, and practitioners provide striking evidence of the power of mindfulness and offer hope to anyone who wants to make classrooms more productive places for living.
Dr. Armstrong’s Resources on Mindfulness
