Leading Minds -Mindfulness for children

Overview

The aim of this program is to help young people learn how to manage the radical shifts in their life-long relationship to thoughts, feelings, and body sensations

Just like they learn to brush their teeth to maintain dental hygiene, implementing Mindfulness practices helps them improve their well-being and make positive lasting changes to their lives.

Children (Aged 3+) 

During this Course, children will learn what we call “Paying Attention on Purpose”. 

Children learn this concept and what it means.  

• Learning to pay attention on purpose to their breath, body, sounds, senses and objects. 
• Body Cues: Children learn to notice where and how they feel emotions on the body and that everyone is different. They learn a vocabulary to explain their emotions and body cues.  
• Breathing Space: Children identify their coping strategies to calm themselves and anchor in the present moment. They identify the coping strategies that work for them. They learn that their breathing space is unique to them and we are all different. This gives them compassion for themselves and others. 
• Respond and Not React: Children learn the difference between responding and reacting to strong emotions and things that have upset them. They learn to use their body cues and breathing space to instill this concept in them for life. 

Leading Minds is a program created for Primary Schools and is for children 8+. 

Children learn Mindfulness such as

• Paying Attention on Purpose,
• Breathing Space
• How to Respond and Not React.

They learn meditations, breathing exercises and games which they can teach to their peers. Once they have become skilled in their own practice and teach for a while they become the school’s Mindfulness Leaders who teach the younger children.

They run clubs at lunchtime, teach breathing exercises to their classes or are paired with children who could benefit from learning Mindfulness. The club run by the children at lunch time has been an overwhelming success.

The younger children are completely engaged by the Mindfulness leaders and a Mindfulness vocabulary and technique has been spread around the school.

The Mindfulness Leaders from The British School of Milan spoke to an Education Committee at BSM in 2023 who were impressed by their knowledge, compassion and genuine feedback about what it was like to be a teacher. The Principal of The British School in Paris sent them each a handwritten letter by name.

For more information on this please contact me.