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Kate Andersen
November 12, 2016
Teaching for Equity

Mindfulness in Education

Many students and teachers suffer from high stress in their daily lives, caused by
anything from their living situation or family life to pressures they are feeling at school.
Experiencing stress for long periods of time can lead to lifelong effects on mental and
physical health, as well as interfering with productivity in daily life, so it is important that
educators find a way to intervene and break this cycle. While there is a great deal of
information on the types of stress and factors that contribute to it, often a missing piece is,
what are schools doing to teach students how to cope with stress? Educators should consider
this quote from Krishnamurti: The highest function of education is to bring about an
integrated individual who is capable of dealing with life as a whole. Many teachers
unintentionally produce mindless learning environments, teaching to the test, and purely
ensure students learn the facts they need as required by state standards. Instead, educators
should consider a mindful learning environment that can not only help students gain
greater perspectives and in-depth knowledge, but give them the skills the need to deal with
life in and outside the classroom to help them eliminate stress.
Many people overlook mindfulness, believing it to be part of a religious or purely
meditative practice, but it is a secular activity or state anyone can adopt into their daily life.
Mindfulness is the state of being conscious or aware of something; it is being able to be
present in the moment and being able to accept your emotions and bodily sensations.
Having a non-judgmental attitude and directed attention can prevent the body from going
into fight or flight mode during a stressful situation, and learn how to respond with a calm

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response, rather than an impulsive reaction. By having a moment-by-moment awareness,
and taking time to focus on breathing and the surrounding environment, overall well being
can be improved.
Mindful Schools, an organization located in Emeryville, California, provides courses
and curriculum for teachers to adopt mindful practices into their classrooms. Teachers can
participate in their classes, or as demonstrated in their film Room to Breathe, a member of
their team can directly intervene in a school by teaching mindfulness to students. In the
film, Megan Cowen, Executive Director of Programs from Mindful Schools, spent six weeks
at Marina Middle School in San Francisco. She was working with a seventh grade class for
thirty minutes, twice a week. The school was struggling with many behavioral issues in
school, and a high rate of suspensions and dropouts. Many students had stressful home and
family situations, and took it out on their classmates through bullying and disruptive
classroom behavior. Megan struggled to get through to students for weeks as they laughed
at her breathing exercises and struggled to take her discussions seriously. But by the end of
the six weeks, many students were on board with a mindful state of mind, and they saw
great improvements in their lives. 80% of students were said to calm down more easily
when upset, 58% focused better in class, several reported they used mindfulness to avoid
arguments or fights, and a third saw improvements in their grades. And best of all, almost
all students who learned mindfulness felt that more kids should learn it as well. Teachers
and parents felt these phenomenal results as well, who vowed to continue these practices
in their classrooms after Megan left.
As demonstrated in the film, there are several benefits for both teachers and
students. Students can use mindfulness to stop themselves from bullying their peers or

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from getting in a fight. Mindfulness is a practical tool teachers can give to students through
quick daily practices that lead to increased focus and concentration in their schoolwork. By
teaching students impulse control, behavior issues can be decreased, and productivity in
the classroom can increase. Mindfulness improves resilience and emotional regulation,
helping one see objectively and recognize your own and the worlds ups and downs. Many
teachers experience great stress in the classroom, especially in the beginning of their
careers, which can often lead to them leaving the profession within the first five years of
teaching. Mindful teachers are able to gain tools needed to focus on teaching their students,
and not the stress surrounding it or anxiety about the future, settling in to a successful
teaching career. It can help educators to be more engaged with their students, by feeling
less time pressure and improved communication. A teachers classroom organization and
management will profit as well, which will help students to learn more effectively, and
reduce the stress they might feel as a result from their teacher or learning environment.
Mindful teaching has gained great popularity over recent years, and there are
several courses and intervention programs that educators can participate in. Helping
students handle and prevent stress not only improves students personal lives and health,
but a teachers ability to be successful. By teaching students to cope with stress at school,
teachers are giving students a tool that they can take with them as they grow up and begin
life outside of school. Small practices can be adopted into any classroom, from something as
simple as taking a few moments to breathe before a test, to guided meditations, or even
writing in gratitude journals. While many students might resist this movement in education
at first, they will quickly see positive results in how they can handle their stress.

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Annotated Bibliography

Brensilver, M. (2016, Sept.). What is Mindfulness? Mindful Schools. Retrieved from
http://www.mindfulschools.org/foundational-concepts/what-is-mindfulness/

Matthew Brensilver, PhD, gives an overview of what mindfulness is, as a state, trait,
or practice. Mindfulness is about being aware in the present time, by having
alertness, clarity, and stability of momentary experience. It also involves
equanimity, or having a sense of cognitive emotional balance and non-compulsion
behavior. Once someone learns how to be mindful, they will be mindful even
without trying to be, making it a habit. By being mindful, one can be aware of the
present moment with a non-judgmental attitude. By adopting mindfulness
practices into daily life, like meditation or posture activities, a mindful state of mind
or mindful habits can become instilled into daily life. In further research with
Mindful Schools through their organization webpage, they discuss the advantages
of mindfulness for both students and educators, which can include increased
productivity and readiness to learn, reduced stress, improving sleep and mood, and
improved engagement in the classroom.

Long, R (Producer & Director). (2012) Room to Breathe [Motion Picture]. United States:
Mindful Schools. Retrieved from http://www.mindfulschools.org/resources/room-tobreathe/

This film is a great local example of a mindful intervention by the program called
Mindful Schools. Marina Middle School in San Francisco struggles with high dropout
and suspension rates, and several behavior issues among students. In an attempt to
help students be more successful in school and with their peers, Megan Cowen,
Executive Director of Programs from Mindful Schools, comes to Marina Middle for
six weeks to work in a seventh grade classroom to teach them mindful practices.
While the students resist her sessions for weeks, the results are phenomenal among
many students when her time in complete, and teachers vow to continue to
incorporate mindful learning in their classrooms. From teaching students how to be
aware of their emotions, breathing techniques, and how to process their reactions in
high stress situations, students were able to focus better in class, use mindfulness to
avoid arguments or fights, see improvements in their grades, clam down easier, and
believed more students should learn mindfulness. By learning mindfulness, Megan
taught her students to develop strength in their mind to have thoughts on purpose
rather than on accident.


Sherretz, C. (2011). Mindfulness in Education: Case Studies of Mindful Teachers and Their
Teaching Practices. Journal of Thought, Vol. 46, No. 3-4, pp.79-96. Retrieved from
http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.dominican.edu/stable/pdf/jthought.46.3-4.79.pdf

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Christine Sherretz references the work of Langer in his assessment of mindful
teachers through a series of case studies. Three teachers were selected based on the
Langer Mindfulness Scale, a 21-question survey where teachers had to score above a
college sample mean in order to be considered mindful. Paula, Annette, and Wilma
were chosen, three 6th grade teachers from Eastside Intermediate School in New
York. There were four major themes observed in each of their classrooms, linking
them to mindful teaching practices. First, they all used process orientation instead of
response orientation, where students were never limited to just one answer, but
encouraged to learn for the sake of learning, and not in search of one particular
result. These women also all gave students choices, which greatly increased student
engagement. These four themes are greatly linked with a mindful classroom,
promoting thinking that can be applied in several different contexts, emphasizing
the processes used in problem solving, and promoting student choice. Just like
through many other mindfulness examples, these ideas prove that the more
students are given the opportunity to be aware of their own thoughts and are
encouraged to think before they react, the more success we will find in a classroom.

Langer, E. (2000, Dec.). Mindful Learning. Current Directions in Psychological Science, Vol. 9,
No. 6, pp. 220-223. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/20182675

Ellen J. Langer writes about her work with mindful learning, as referenced by
Christine Sherretz in Mindfulness in Education: Case Studies of Mindful Teachers
and Their Teaching Practices. Langer emphasizes that most teaching fosters
mindlessness, without educators even realizing it, where facts are given without
any perspective or context. When teachers are mindful, they help students
perspective about the context of what they are learning. Langer discusses three
myths about learning that lead to mindlessness rather than mindfulness:
1. The basics should be learned so well that they become second nature.
2. To pay attention to something, we should hold it still and focus on it.
3. It is important to learn how to delay gratification.
When these myths are true, it means that students will not know how to adapt
knowledge to new situations, they will not consider the variation that is so present
in every day life practices. If we were to just hold still and focus on something to
pay attention to it, the image will eventually face from view. By delaying
gratification, we suggest tasks are either good or bad. By being mindful, educators
can break these myths, and teach students to be present in the classroom, see a full
view of what they are learning, and experience more positive outcomes and
emotions.

Pearce Stevens, A. (2016, March). Mindfulness Defuses Stress in Classrooms and Teaching.
Science News for Students. Retrieved from
https://www.sciencenewsforstudents.org/article/%E2%80%98mindfulness%E2%80%99
-defuses-stress-classrooms-and-teaching

While many studies focus on the effects mindfulness will have for students, Alison
Pearce Stevens gives insight into the great effect it can have for teachers. A

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nonjudgmental attitude and directed attention gained from mindfulness will leave
behind stressful events from the past and defuse anxiety about the future.
Mindfulness allows teachers to focus on the task at hand, and improve their
communication with students in what can be a very stressful setting. When a study
was conducted with two groups of teachers, one group participating in CARE
training about mindfulness, the other as a control group, the teachers who learned
and adapted mindfulness into their classroom saw improved overall wellbeing,
lower stress levels, less pressure about time, and saw they were much more
effective and engaged with their students than the teachers in the control group. By
recognizing the emotions they are experiencing, teachers can participate in much
better communication with their students, and be more attentive to their needs on a
daily basis.