‘We ordered a copy of Mindfulness for Schools a few years ago and we’ve been really enjoying using it. We now do a term of Mindfulness with all pupils in Y7 and we also offer half a term of Mindfulness to Y10 & Y11 groups as part of an optional PPE type enrichment program. I’d like to order another copy, please. It’s a lovely package — I just wanted to thank you and give you some positive feedback.’
Jonathan Chuter, Teacher of Religion and Philosophy, Colfe’s School, SE London. January 2015
‘I have really enjoyed reading and using your Mindfulness book and found it extremely helpful… Please feel free to quote me on your website. It would be a privilege to be linked to your wonderful work.’
Chris Easom, Independent Religious Education Consultant using mindful awareness with children and young people. Staffordshire, UK.
‘Could I order 3 more of your training course for teachers and teenagers. It is a brilliant book and I am happy to say that slowly but surely I am getting more mindfulness awareness into our school.’
Christine Lee, the Godolphin and Latymer School, Hammersmith. March 2014.
‘Thank you for … the marvellous book…I love the front cartoon which I will photocopy for our 17 year old! … it is choc full of great material. Keep up the great work.’
Anthony Seldon, Headmaster Wellington College. 2010
‘I received “Mindfulness for Schools” today and absolutely love it!! Finally, a clear, concise guide that teenagers can understand!! I have put in an order for three more copies…thank you for writing the book. Amazing!!!‘
Doug Worthen, Maryland, USA
MINDFULNESS GETS AN EDUCATIONAL BOOST IN BRITAIN
Posted 29/3/13 to Association for Mindfulness in Education (AME). On 27 March 2013 some 750 teachers filled Friends House in London to hear Jon Kabat Zinn talk about Mindfulness in Education. The day before he had spoken to MPs and shadow ministers in Parliament, and that afternoon he was off to the Prime Minister’s Policy Unit in Downing Street: David Cameron is thinking about measuring an Index of National Wellbeing.
…‘Can you believe what’s happening today?’ Jon asked. ‘Mindfulness is spreading like wildfire…’ Teaching mindfulness to young people gives them ‘advance training in the art of living’. However, this will need ‘cohorts of trained teachers.’
…He was at the Mindfulness in Schools Project’s third annual conference. Congratulating them on their .b (Stop Be) programme, he called it ‘a work of genius’. Lessons involve FOFBOC (feet on floor, bums on chairs), 7/11 (counting 7 on the in-breath and 11 on the out-breath) and Beditation (lying on the floor). Three classroom groups of varying ages, who came with their teachers, spoke ‘magically’, as someone else said, about what these exercises did for them.
Carol (www.mindfulnessforschools.com).
JON KABAT-ZINN VISITS OXFORD
Posted 16/11/10 to Association for Mindfulness in Education (AME)
Last week Jon Kabat-Zinn held a giant fireside chat in Oxford and recounted his remarkable Mindfulness story, which many of you will know*. Hosted by Mark Williams, one of the inventors of Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT), 700 people turned out on a dark night. Why?
…Mindfulness is not ‘much ado about nothing’, there is a ‘yearning to come into deep connection with ourselves’, he said. Calling the subject ‘awarenessing — he regrets that ‘what we most need doesn’t often happen in higher education’. However, Mindfulness may be ‘moving the bellcurve of society away from the homo sapiens sapiens default mode’ of greed, hatred and delusion, though he works on a thousand year view!
…Research papers on Mindfulness are soaring, and funding too. MBCT is being used in the UK’s National Health Service. We need to pour energy into Mindfulness in education. He says this would be a ‘radical act of compassion — trust it, see where it leads — we so devalue awareness compared to thinking’.
It was a heartening occasion.
Carol (www.mindfulnessforschools.com)
Quote: ‘I thought I’d died and gone to heaven’ At the first scientific gathering — in 2004 in the US — of neuroscientists, psychologists, the Dalai Lama and eminent Buddhist thinkers.
USEFUL LINKS:
The full Goodwill Art catalogue: www.goodwillart.co.uk
The Oxford Mindfulness Centre: www.oxfordmindfulness.org