Tagged With "Dynamic Mindfulness"
Blog Post
10 Simple Steps for Reducing Toxic Stress in the Classroom
As the brain science on adverse childhood experiences evolves, teaching must, too By Jim Hickman & Kathy Higgins We all know that when children aren’t well, they’re less likely to learn. More and more teachers recognize that children who can’t sit still in class, act out, or have asthma may be showing warning signs of a toxic exposure to childhood trauma. More than two decades ago, landmark research from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Kaiser Permanente found that...
Blog Post
1st Annual Nat'l Conference for Creating Trauma-Sensitive Schools: Call for Workshop Proposals
Deadline: Nov. 1, 2017 The Attachment & Trauma Network, Inc. (ATN) is hosting this National Conference for Creating Trauma-Sensitive Schools at the Washington Hilton Washington, DC, February 19-20, 2018, to give all educators — teachers, administrators and school personnel — as well as other child-serving professionals, community leaders and parents an opportunity to explore the importance of trauma-informed care for in schools and other child-serving environments. Through the ACE...
Blog Post
2017 Children's Mental Health Report
Of the 74.5 million children in the United States, an estimated 17.1 million have or have had a mental health disorder — more than the number of children with cancer, diabetes and AIDS combined. Half of all mental illness occurs before the age of 14, and 75 percent by the age of 24. In spite of the magnitude of the problem, lack of awareness and entrenched stigma keep the majority of these young people from getting help. Children and adolescents struggling with these disorders are at risk...
Blog Post
8 Benefits of Yoga for Kids (wakeup-world.com)
Children these days deal with stress, distractions, peer pressure, over-stimulation, etc., and for this reason, the low-cost practice of yoga can benefit their well being immensely. Little ones have their own battles, races, and tension, and to bear it all, they require a calm mind and a healthy body. 1. Yoga Improves Concentration 2. Yoga Builds Confidence and Self-Esteem 3. Yoga Alleviates Stress (Something We All Face) 4. Yoga Promotes a Healthy Body and Mind 5. Yoga Teaches Body Balance...
Blog Post
A Conversation with Nadine Burke Harris: How Should Pediatricians Address Childhood Adversity?
Pediatrician Nadine Burke Harris is a masterful storyteller. I learned in a conversation with her at Wheelock College before her presentation for the Brookline, MA organization Steps to Success , that before she decided to become doctor, Dr. Burke Harris wanted to be an author. Only after the smashing success of her TED talk: How childhood trauma affects health across a lifetime , when she was approached by a literary agent, did she find her way to writing. Her newly released book The...
Blog Post
Middle school tackles everybody's trauma; result is calmer, happier kids, teachers and big drop in suspensions
6 th grader Cayla White (right) helps lead class meditation with Niroga Institute’s Lauren Banister/ photos by Laurie Udesky During the 2014/2015 school year, things were looking grim at Park Middle School in Antioch, CA. At the time, staff couldn’t corral student disruptions. Teacher morale was plummeting. By the end of February 2015, 192 kids of the 997 students had been suspended -- 19.2 percent of the student population. “I was watching really good people burning out from the [teaching]...
Blog Post
Advice for New Principals: Be 'Emotionally Vulnerable With Your Staff' (edweek.org)
In our second installment of advice for new principals, Education Week talked to Melissa Hensley, who just finished her seventh year as principal of Central High School in Woodstock, Va. Hensley was the Virginia state principal of the year in 2016 and a finalist for the 2017 National Principal of the Year, an award given by the National Association of Secondary School Principals. EW: What words of wisdom do you have for a first-year principal? HENSLEY : One thing that really comes to...
Blog Post
Against the Tide
“I don’t know if I can do this anymore, Kris. I am just so discouraged.” I sit with my dear friend on a sticky summer night trying to get my gut right. “Gut wrench” is an apt description. It’s invaded my body and overwhelmed my mind. I can’t think straight, see straight, see a way out. The darkness pervading her porch has met my inner ache and it’s threatening to overwhelm my composure. I am choking back a watershed of tears as I open my mouth to speak. I am trying to conjure the words to...
Blog Post
An Alternative to Suspension with Trauma-Informed Dynamic Mindfulness: Building Stress Resilience, Emotion Regulation and Empathy
At the November 2019 Northern California Safe and Healthy Schools Conference at UC Berkeley, Niroga Program Managers Sam Weiss and Fatima Ahmed facilitated a session incorporating the theory and practice of Dynamic Mindfulness (DMind) to a standing room only crowd.
Blog Post
An Inside Look at Attachment and Trauma
"Thanks to Janyne’s transparent telling of her own story, the complex concept of dissociation can be understood without needing a psychology degree.” MELISSA SADIN, Exec. Director of Ducks & Lions, Program Director of ATN Creating Trauma Sensitive Schools, Author of Teachers Guide to Trauma
Blog Post
As The Number Of Homeless Students Soars, How Schools Can Serve Them Better (npr.org)
(Image: Chris Kindred for NPR) When Caitlin Cheney was living at a campground in Washington state with her mother and younger sister, she would do homework by the light of the portable toilets, sitting on the concrete. She maintained nearly straight A's even though she had to hitchhike to school, making it there an average of three days a week. "I really liked doing homework," says Cheney, 22, who is now an undergraduate zoology student at Washington State University. "It kept my mind off...
Blog Post
Peek Inside a Classroom: Jasmine
© Elliot Gilfix/Flickr . What happened to Jasmine? . Photo © Jinx!/Flickr When you look inside a...
Blog Post
Program offers hundreds of young men, boys safe space to heal from ACEs
Dennis McCollins recounts some of the experiences that caused him to harden against the world as a teenager. “There were times I went to more funerals than birthdays,” says McCollins, who is the clinical director of the School Based Health Center at Greenwood Academy in Richmond, Calif. And it took its toll: “I spent time homeless. I got expelled [from school]. I was so angry and upset and mad,” he says. Dennis McCollins Then a man that he met when he was sent to Job Corps as a teen turned...
Blog Post
Control, Predictability Can Help Counter Students' Trauma, Research Finds [blogs.edweek.org]
Interventions that help students think flexibly and feel more control over their learning may help counter the effects of disadvantage and trauma, suggests emerging research at the International Mind-Brain Education conference here. More than 1 in 3 U.S. children have experienced at least one major trauma—from abuse or neglect to the loss of a family member to death, prison, or drugs—by the time they enter kindergarten. By the end of their school years, nearly half have had at least one...
Blog Post
ConVal High School's Story: Becoming Trauma-Informed for Substance Abuse Prevention
As a student assistance counselor, I regularly receive flashy emails from various organizations promoting materials for drug-free schools. Secretly I roll my eyes and strike the trash icon. “Drug free schools - ha, right?!” It may sound cynical or jaded that I don’t believe in drug-free high schools. It’s not that. The truth is I don’t believe a drug-free high school exists. This isn’t from a lack of effort or concern. As a product of the “Just Say No” era, schools have worked for decades to...
Blog Post
Creating School Level Resiliency Teams
RESILIENCY TEAM TRAINING Cape May & Atlantic County School Districts- Southern NJ Applied Educational Neuroscience, the Brain and Adversity- “Stressed Brains Do Not Learn” Purpose: To provide training for school level teams on the latest research and strategies concerning Educational Neuroscience, the Brain, Stress and Adversity. To create school level “turnkey” teams focusing on the skills and organizational components necessary to create trauma sensitive AND trauma responsive...
Blog Post
Dalai Lama Presides Over Global Launch of Emory’s SEE Learning Program in New Delhi [Buddhistdoor Global]
His Holiness the Dalai Lama at the SEE Learning launch. Photo from businessworld.in His Holiness the Dalai Lama last week presided over a three-day event in New Delhi marking the global launch of the landmark Social, Emotional and Ethical (SEE) Learning program developed by Emory University in collaboration with the Dalai Lama Trust and the Vana Foundation. The 4–6 April gathering in the Indian capital, featuring a host of educational experts and policy leaders from around the world,...
Blog Post
Development and Implementation of Standards for Social and Emotional Learning in the 50 States (selpractices.org)
Development and Implementation of Standards for Social and Emotional Learning in the 50 States · SEL Thrive { "@context" : "http://schema.org", "@type" : "Organization", "name" : "SEL Thrive", "url" : "https://www.selpractices.org/", "logo": "https://www.selpractices.org/apple-touch-icon-180x180.png", "sameAs" : [ "https://www.facebook.com/", "https://twitter.com/" ], // "contactPoint" : [{ // "@type" : "ContactPoint", // "telephone" : "+1-555-555-555", // "contactType" : "customer service"...
Blog Post
Donna Jackson Nakazawa Chats Live with Jane Stevens & You: Nov. 14th
Featured Guest: @Donna Jackson Nakazawa Topic: Well-Being, Self-Care & ACEs Date: November 14th, 2017 Time: 10 AM PST / 1 PM EST Where: Here / Chats Donna Jackson Nakazawa is an winning researcher, writer and public speaker on health and family issues. She explores the intersection between neuroscience, immunology, and the deepest inner workings of the human heart. Her most recent book, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal , examines...
Blog Post
Education resources, including mental health, for kids, families during coronavirus pandemic
We have an abundance of helpful links and posts swirling online to support families and school systems as we adjust to our new normal of learning while self-isolating at home. Thousands of free academic resources from the NYT student writing prompts, to the Anti-Racist, Anti-Oppressive Homeschool Resource list, to this excellent collection from BuzzFeed, and the ever-growing crowd-sourced collection aptly named Amazing Educational Resources are being shared. Our schools do so much more than...
Blog Post
For Kids, Anxiety About School Can Feel Like 'Being Chased By A Lion' (npr.org)
Everyone feels anxious once in awhile: dry mouth, sweaty palms, a pounding heart. In fact, anxiety is the most common mental health disorder. "Anxiety feels no different if you're being chased by a lion or you have to go to school,"says Erin Berman, a clinical psychologist with the National Institute of Mental Health. Some grow out of it; others don't. "They may look like they're not doing their homework, they're not paying attention," she says about these anxious children. But, "their mind...
Blog Post
For Kids With Anxiety, Parents Learn To Let Them Face Their Fears [npr.org]
The first time Jessica Calise can remember her 9-year-old son Joseph's anxiety spiking was about a year ago, when he had to perform at a school concert. He said his stomach hurt and he might throw up. "We spent the whole performance in the bathroom," she recalls. After that, Joseph struggled whenever he had to do something alone, like showering or sleeping in his bedroom. He would beg his parents to sit outside the bathroom door or let him sleep in their bed. "It's heartbreaking to see your...
Blog Post
For those that ordered... the trauma-informed curriculum for churches is headed out the door this week!
It's been a labor of love more than a year in the making, and it is exciting to see the curriculum come together and head out to those that will give this first version a "test drive" this spring and (hopefully) give me some great feedback so I can make improvements over the summer and make the curriculum better! It is called "Bruised Reeds and Smoldering Wicks: a six week study of trauma-informed ministry and compassionate care for children from hard places and situations." The study is...
Blog Post
From "Common Core" to "Common Care" Standards - Making the Connection between Academic Content and a Compassionate Academy
For many, a shift in professional standards for school administrators might be proverbial "back page" news. Think again, especially for those who recognize that in and across our school systems there has been little understanding of the connection...
Blog Post
From Trauma to Peace: Mindfulness Program at Willard Middle School
From Berkeley Public Schools Fund, March 22, 2018 Once a week at Willard Middle School, there’s an unexpected sight of a classroom full of students sitting still with their eyes closed. With the support of our Strategic Impact Grant , Willard Middle School has implemented a weekly Dynamic Mindfulness program where students engage in mindful ABCs (Actions, Behaviors, and Centering) during their Advisory period. The 15-minute program involves grounding activities from listening to a bell until...
Blog Post
From Understanding Eyes to Understanding Minds – Tracing the Building Blocks of Social Cognition (Institute for Learning and Brain Science)
I n the first few years of life, children begin to piece together an awareness of the thoughts, feelings and desires of the people around them, gradually building skills to help them succeed in our social world. While many studies have examined...
Blog Post
Gathering in Topeka, Kansas for the Educators’ Art of Facilitation Chapter IV
According to Alice Miller author of The Drama of the Gifted Child, an Enlightened Witness is “an understanding person who helps a victim of abuse recognize the injustice they suffered and gives vent to their feelings about what happened to them”. Brene Brown author of Daring Greatly states, "empathy is feeling with or alongside someone, while sympathy is feeling sorry for." https://youtu.be/1Evwgu369Jw In Topeka we unpacked and explored the message of the Enlightened Witnesses in our lives.
Blog Post
Get Education Right From the Start of School [PSMag.com]
Starting school at kindergarten. One teacher for an age-graded classroom. Teacher-led learning: “Repeat after me.” For nearly 100 years, these have been the traditions, routines, and expectations of American primary schools. Over that time, much has changed in children’s lives — there is now greater demographic diversity, to say nothing of the relentlessly changing technology, globalization, and growing recognition that education requires much more than rote learning — yet little has changed...
Blog Post
Graduations, non-linear paths, & the importance of getting started
With graduation season upon us, I have been thinking a lot about one of my favorite graduation speeches. It’s the speech that Shonda Rhimes, creator of Grey’s Anatomy, gave in 2014 at Dartmouth College. She references the typical expected advice from a graduation speech: “Follow your dreams. Listen to your spirit. Change the world. Make your mark. Find your inner voice and make it sing. Embrace failure. Dream. Dream and dream big." And then she says, "I think that's crap."
Blog Post
Healthy Body, Healthy Mind: A Social Emotional Health Twitter Chat
Wednesday, August 21st: join Alliance for a Healthier Generation @HealthierGen at 1 PM EST for a special chat to discuss the findings of our recent SEH market research study and the ways we can best meet the health needs of the #WholeChild —at school, during out-of-school time, and at home.
Blog Post
Holiday Stress, Self Care and Mirror Neurons
With Thanksgiving behind us, and the new year looming ahead, we are clearly in the midst of the holiday season. It is easy to focus on our students and their behavior this time of year. However, I would like to turn the focus back on us: the educators, caregivers and administrators. Though it is likely for different reasons than our students, many of us find the holidays to be a rather stressful time. You may be hosting, cooking, traveling, shopping, wrapping, financially strained,...
Blog Post
How do these pediatricians do ACEs screening? Early adopters tell all.
Last week, three pediatricians — with a combined experience of 15 years integrating ACEs science into their practices — reflected on the urgency they felt several years ago that prompted them to begin screening patients for childhood adversity and resilience when there was practically no guidance at all. Along their journey , they accumulated a list of lessons learned for other pediatricians and family clinics to use. The three pediatricians participated in the ACEs Connection webinar,...
Blog Post
How It Feels & How We Heal: Parenting with ACEs Chat Quotes (You Tube, Database, PDFs, Links)
Parenting with ACEs is sharing inspiration, information, and expertise from our chat series in 3 formats. Parenting with ACEs: How It Feels & How We Heal Quote Collection (pdf version below as well) Quotes Database (pdf version below as well) Links to Chat Transcripts and before and after-the-chat blog posts. Thanks to everyone who showed up, who shared, and who is doing the important work that is our mission (prevent ACEs, heal trauma, build resilience). We know that work happens...
Blog Post
How Making Time for Mindfulness Helps Students (kqed.org)
A new study suggests that mindfulness education — lessons on techniques to calm the mind and body — can reduce the negative effects of stress and increase students’ ability to stay engaged, helping them stay on track academically and avoid behavior problems. After finding that students who self-reported mindful habits performed better on tests and had higher grades, researchers with the Boston Charter Research Collaborative — a partnership between the Center for Education Policy Research at...
Blog Post
How Women's Studies is Helping Rural Teens Fix Their Social Culture [psmag.com]
On an early December morning at Golden Valley High School in Central California, a few girls, wrapped in a seasonal trend of blankets instead of coats, shuffle into Annie Delgado's classroom. They settle into desks among other sophomores, juniors, and seniors as an electronic blare jump-starts fourth period. Delgado, 45, reading glasses pushed to the top of her head, instructs them to reflect on the conversations about body positivity and social media they began last fall. "Do you ever stop...
Blog Post
Improve Classroom Climate with Dynamic Mindfulness
Improve Classroom Climate with Dynamic Mindfulness January 2020 We know that challenges with toxic stress and trauma amongst our educators and the youth they serve affect learning readiness, school classroom climate, and teacher burnout. What can we do about it? Many educators are struggling with this question and searching for answers. Niroga Institute's Dynamic Mindfulness (DMind) programs should be considered as a comprehensive solution. Dynamic Mindfulness is a combination of movement,...
Blog Post
School Violence Prevention Webinar Series
School violence is rapidly becoming a top-of-mind issue, with instances of bullying, dating violence, and suicide on the rise in recent years. According to the CDC, 20.2% of students reported being bullied on school property, 6.0% said they had been threatened or injured with a weapon, and 7.8% reported being in a physical fight on school property in 2015. Additionally, 17.7% of students reported that they seriously considered attempting suicide that same year. The correlation between school...
Blog Post
School Violence Prevention Webinar Series
School violence is rapidly becoming a top-of-mind issue, with instances of bullying, dating violence, and suicide on the rise in recent years. According to the CDC, 20.2% of students reported being bullied on school property, 6.0% said they had been threatened or injured with a weapon, and 7.8% reported being in a physical fight on school property in 2015. Additionally, 17.7% of students reported that they seriously considered attempting suicide that same year. The correlation between school...
Blog Post
Setting the Tone for a Mindful School
From ACSD Express Setting the Tone for September August 23, 2018 | Volume 13 | Issue 24 Table of Contents Setting the Tone for a Mindful School John Jimno and Bidyut K. Bose A Principal's Story: As I (John) prepared to leave at the end of a long school day, a student I'll call "Carl" came running toward me across the asphalt, clearly upset and in tears. Shortly after, another student whom I'll call "Ron" came tearing across the yard in our direction. Ron was frequently referred to my office...
Blog Post
Some 350 Florida Leaders Expected to Attend Think Tank with Dr. Vincent Felitti, Co-Principal Investigator of the ACE Study; Expert on ACEs Science
Leaders from across the Sunshine State will take part in a “Think Tank” in Naples, FL, on Monday, August 6, to help create a more trauma-informed Florida. The estimated 350 attendees will include policy makers and community teams made up of school superintendents, law enforcement officers, judges, hospital administrators, mayors, PTA presidents, child welfare experts, mental health and substance abuse treatment providers, philanthropists, university researchers, state agency heads, and...
Blog Post
Sonoma County Trauma-Informed Teaching: Knowing our Students' Stories and Fostering Resilience
Sonoma County Office of Education published this bulletin that provides an overview of ACEs science, trauma in Sonoma County, trauma-informed teaching strategies, and building resilience for teachers and students. It's attached to this post, and also available for download in this group's resources for download section.
Blog Post
Superkid Power Guidebook
In Southern Oregon, Janai Mestrovich, MS, Early Learning & Child Development, labels her curriculum Empowering Superkids. The focus is on pre-K and Kindergarten kids and teaching them to know her/himself and tap inner resources of mind/body/emotions/breathing and have skills to make good choices and feel like a SUPERKID. Teaching self awareness, self respect and communication/collaboration are essential towards resiliency. Janai has developed and taught the Superkid Guidebook over a 40...
Blog Post
Teaching Black Students Love in a System That Doesn’t Always Love Them Back [the74million.org]
C ornel West said we have a history that is “inseparable from though not reducible to victimization.” This is just as essential as it is difficult to keep in mind when white high school dropouts own more wealth than black and Latino college graduates . Black children in America today are constantly being told that they do not belong and they are not enough. The past several years have forced me to reflect on what it means to be not only a black man in this country but a black educator for...
Blog Post
TEDxAmherst: Checking in With Yourself
High school is stressful. Spending hours a day sitting hunched over small desks writing papers and taking notes only to go home and spend even longer working can take its toll on anyone. Not only is your body cramped, but you start to lose focus because you’re stressing over deadlines or upcoming tests. Well, Kofi Charu Nat Turner, a professor at UMass Amherst has a practice for you. It’s called “ Dynamic Mindfulness ” and he has been bringing it to the inner city New Jersey schools for...
Blog Post
The Absence of Punishment in Our Schools
Where to begin... My heart is full of hope and joy as I watch the trauma-informed schools movement swell across our nation and planet. The science of ACEs is mind-bending to say the least and we are now able to open up a much deeper dialogue about human behavior and health. Ultimately this work is about healing… All. Of. Us. A new consciousness is taking root around ending the “us vs them” construct. The idea is growing that we’re all on this journey together and that no matter where our...
Blog Post
The Art of Control ACTIVITIES AND RESOURCES TO ENHANCE EXECUTIVE FUNCTION IN YOUNG CHILDREN
Executive function — our ability to remember and use what we know, defeat our unproductive impulses, and switch gears and adjust to new demands — is increasingly understood as a key element not just of learning but of lifelong...
Blog Post
The federal Handle with Care Act is designed to connect children who experience trauma to trauma informed school resources
Click here for the full press release: Proposed Federal Legislation: Handle with Care Act KAINE, MANCHIN, CAPITO INTRODUCE BIPARTISAN LEGISLATION TO CARE FOR CHILDREN IMPACTED BY OPIOID ABUSE Thursday, April 26, 2018 Bristol Virginia Public Schools Superintendent: this bill ‘will equip us to better achieve our vision of enabling all students to thrive’ Washington, D.C. – Yesterday, U.S. Senators Tim Kaine (D-VA), Joe Manchin (D-WV), and Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) introduced the Handle with...
Blog Post
Mind Matters: Overcoming Adversity and Building Resilience Curriculum
With teaching High School Health, I began using this curriculum in the fall semester 2017. Students are responding to this; asking for it! This engages students and speaks to them at their level. https://www.dibbleinstitute.org/mind-matters-more-details/ How about we front load all students with coping skills for trauma... before trauma hits? We know that everyone will feel the affects of trauma at some point in their life: a car wreak, a divorce, or possibly a death. Happy to answer any...
Blog Post
Mind Powers: Meditation Matters for Special Education Students [ChronicleofSocialChange.org]
While meditation has expanded in recent years from a zen-seeker’s path to higher consciousness to a best practice for hard-charging CEOs, it’s now gaining a foothold at a school in Southern California serving students with serious emotional and behavioral issues. Administrators at the Five Acres School in Altadena, Calif., are testing whether meditation and mindfulness can help students succeed in the classroom. A new mindfulness program implemented there in two semesters over...