Incorporating mindfulness in the classroom can be a great strategy to help students self-monitor their own behavior and anxiety. Mindfulness isn’t just meditation; you can bring mindfulness exercises into your classroom in many ways and tailor the exercises based on your students’ needs. 

Mindfulness through Movement

• Try a Sun Salutation in chairs with your students.
• Incorporate slow stretching movements to begin or end class. 
• Have each student contribute a stretch, movement, or dance move that everyone else joins or tries out together. Try doing this in a circle. On each person’s turn they can also share a reflection, or how they are feeling.  
• Ask students to inhale & tighten their muscles (shoulders, hands, face), hold, and then release both breath and muscles. Repeat as needed.

Mindfulness Through Sensory Experiences

• Try playing relaxing music or other calming sounds in the classroom. 
• Have tactile objects to squeeze or explore available. 
• Create a ‘Calm Jar’ for students to shake and then watch settle.
• Pass a tactile object around a circle—each student can take a moment to explore the object and then share verbally (a descriptive word, how they are feeling, a reflection) 

Mindfulness Through Ensemble Building Games

Group Counting Exercises: 

• Version 1: This exercise works best in a circle. The goal of the game is to maintain a pattern of counting in which each number gets repeated by as many students as the number. In other words, one student says, “One.” The next two students say “Two” and “Two.” The next three students say “Three,” “Three,” and “Three.” If a student gets stuck or says the wrong number, they can either get support from the group to get back on track or simply start back at “One.”

• Version 2: Challenge your students to count from one to thirty as a group out loud, but you’re not going to tell anyone what number to say. This means they’ll have to tune in to the group. If two students say a number at the same time, the group starts back at one.
  • Note: There is the potential that a group might experience frustration, exacerbated by disability or trauma-response, during this exercise. It is important, therefore, that Teaching Artists and Classroom Professionals are mindful of their students and how they are responding to this activity. 

ABC Puzzle:  

• Version 1 (Individual): Ask students to write the alphabet on a piece of paper. Explain that when you say “Go” their task is to write a word for each letter of the alphabet in three minutes. You can give students a theme like colors, foods, or musical groups. Bonus points if your prompt connects to your curriculum. 
  • Modification Idea: In order to mitigate the potential feeling of “failing”, the prompt could be modified to, “write a word for as many of the letters as you can in three minutes.”
• Version 2 (Group): Write the alphabet on a piece of chart paper. Complete the challenge as a class or in smaller groups (each with their own chart paper).