What I do
What I do is very much tailored to whoever I’m working with. Part of this is working with schools to identify how I can best help them – whether that’s by delivering whole school training sessions, working with specific teachers to help them become the school experts, teaching Mindfulness to groups of children, or helping give advice on teacher wellbeing.
Mindfulness for Children
Giving teachers an introduction to what Mindfulness is (and isn’t) and how they can use it in their classrooms to benefit the children they teach, helping them develop social and emotional skills.
Evidence is increasingly showing that Mindfulness can help children to:
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Focus and pay attention
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Calm themselves
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Participate
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Manage their behaviour and emotions
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Practise respect, compassion and kindness
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Cope with anxiety and stress
These also link into any whole-school work that is in place for elements such as Resilience and Growth Mindset.
Mindfulness to support Teachers and Staff with Mental Wellbeing
Helping teachers/school staff to find ways of understanding what stress and anxiety is, especially in the context of their jobs, and learning practical ways of dealing with this.
Too often strategies like Mindfulness are introduced and the reality is that teachers don’t have time to do them. In some cases it just adds an extra level of stress because they feel like it’s another thing on their list that can’t be done.
Having spent years in the classroom I understand the realities of the job and how to actually integrate useful and effective strategies into the school day.
