Faiy has had a longstanding relationship with MiSP of over a decade, starting with her own training in 2013, becoming a valued trainer in 2015 and starting her current role as Education and Pathways Development Manager in 2021.

Faiy has worked tirelessly to develop and launch The Pathways. She has also created the current wide-ranging skills workshops and a variety of flexible training models to increase accessibility to MiSP’s work. Her knowledge and skills are key to the fidelity of our trainings, enriching the training experience for everyone who joins the MiSP family and supporting them throughout their implementation journey. Just as MiSP encourages our trained teachers to know their children and young people and meet them where they are, so Faiy has been key in creating the Pathways so that they meet you where you are.

Alongside this work, Faiy initiated and co-developed mapping the MiSP curricula to the PSHE Association’s Programmes of Study and to the Curriculum for Wales. She has also spearheaded the Peace in Mind campaign for bringing mindfulness to all schools in Warrington, working closely with MiSP Ambassador Esther Ghey and Emma Mills.

Many of you will already be familiar with Faiy from trainings, skills workshops and through her representing MiSP in our online Speaker Events and other events across the country and worldwide. Recently she gave a presentation in person, alongside Esther Ghey, at the Mindfulness Initiative’s Westminster Education event, discussing how the work in Warrington meets the MiSP Pathways’ evidence-based framework.

As well as her deep understanding of MiSP’s vision, mission and needs and her commitment to the integrity of what we do, Faiy has a wealth of education, mindfulness and wellbeing experience, which, in combination with her leadership skills made her the natural choice for the role.

Faiy is a secondary teacher with Initial Teacher Training Lead experience, an MBSR-trained adult mindfulness teacher (Bangor CMRP), a mindfulness supervisor and a Specialist Leader of Education for Wellbeing and Inclusion, and in the last sixteen years has trained in a wide range of wellbeing curricula and practices; including mindfulness, trauma-informed practice in schools, positive psychology, growth mindsets, compassion plus emotional and academic resilience. She has also trained as a Forest School Leader and Nature Connection practitioner and has a passion for outdoor learning, both for its wellbeing and learning skills benefits.

Faiy worked in a wellbeing lead role in a secondary school for 6 years and since  then peripatetically in primary and secondary schools, teaching mindfulness and other wellbeing modalities to students, educators and senior leaders. This extensive experience and expertise resulted in her working for The Present for Schools, MiSP and LEAP online, delivering training on Wellbeing in Education and Mindfulness around Europe and further afield.

She has a passion for and experience of supporting schools in integrating meaningful wellbeing practice and policy across the whole school that meets Department for Education (DFE) recommendations, recognising that every member of the school community needs to be thriving for a school to perform at its’ best.

We are incredibly grateful to Faiy for taking on this role and excited to see where MiSP will go in her capable hands.

Working alongside Faiy, Elinor Brown will be taking the role of Head of Operations.

Elinor has also been connected with MiSP for over a decade, through her own training, becoming a highly respected trainer for MiSP since 2017 and supporting the charity’s operations on a freelance basis before joining the core team as Strategic Support Coordinator. She has also worked in a lead role with The Present courses CIC in recent years. Many of you will already be familiar with Elinor from trainings and other MiSP events.

Elinor brings extensive experience of mindfulness, education and wellbeing, as an adult MBSR teacher, trained with Bangor University CMRP, and through her work as a Wellbeing Lead in primary education.

As a Wellbeing Lead, she developed whole school approaches which included dots, Paws b, .breathe and The Present curricula, woven in with elements of the PSHE curriculum. She is also familiar with SEL interventions for individuals, including Zones of Regulation. She has experience of working with external agencies and internal wellbeing teams, individual children and small groups, as well as supporting parents, carers and education staff. She has followed the Anna Freud 5 Steps framework and developed school wellbeing policies  She has also worked peripatetically, as an external teacher, bringing MiSP curricula to primary schools.

With a clinical psychologist colleague, Elinor has offered mindfulness for adoptive parents through Coram Cambridgeshire Adoption and co-developed and co-led a programme for parents and carers combining Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) with mindfulness. Elinor has also created and delivered workshops and resources for parents and carers to support children experiencing difficulties with sleep, worry, friendships and emotion regulation, and workshops for education staff to support their wellbeing and help them support children.

Elinor has experience of working in adult education, with the University of Cambridge, delivering mindfulness-based courses and workshops to students and staff.

Elinor trained in trauma-sensitive practice with David Treleaven. She has completed an introduction to counselling and has training in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Non-violent Communication and Equality, Diversity and Inclusion. She has participated in Compassionate Mind Training for education staff and students. She is also trained as a yoga teacher and has a love of mindful movement.

Before teaching mindfulness and working in education, Elinor worked in digital and broadcast media as a producer and managing editor and then ran her own self-employed business. She brings experience in project management, team leadership, marketing, web design, content creation, bookkeeping, maintaining standards and operational efficiency, and working with senior leaders.

She is passionate about maintaining MiSP’s high standards and supporting the charity to nurture individual and whole community wellbeing.

We hope you will join us in wishing them well.

The post Welcoming our new Executive Director and Head of Operations from September 2025 appeared first on Mindfulness in Schools Project.

It’s with a mixture of sadness and joy that we wish Ben well for September, when he will be leaving his role at MiSP, as Head of Education and Training, and taking his many qualities and skills back into school as a primary Headteacher.

Ben has been instrumental in shaping MiSP over the last 8 years, bringing a wealth of education and mindfulness experience to the charity, as well as his energy, creativity, leadership skills, care and humour. He will be leaving an incredible legacy, including the wonderful dots curriculum, the redevelopment of Paws b and co-developing .begin.

Many of you may have met him in trainings, at information webinars, practice groups, retreats and other support events, and benefitted firsthand from his knowledge and qualities.

Behind the scenes, Ben has been key to creating a culture and training approach that enables us all to feel that we can show up as ourselves in the way we offer the learning, which is so key to authenticity and integrity in mindfulness teaching and training and has been incredibly supportive for us as teachers and trainers.

Ben has also been key in supporting our International Partners, building valued relationships and helping MiSP spread our charitable aims across the globe.

We will miss him deeply. At the same time, we are thrilled for him and know he will be a gift to his new school. We are looking forward to staying in touch and hearing how he gets on.

I am sure you will join us in thanking him and wishing him well

The post A farewell with huge gratitude to Ben Chalwin  appeared first on Mindfulness in Schools Project.

The MiSP Pathways Portfolio helps you keep a record of the wide range of development work you have done, personally and professionally, to create a sustainable mindfulness approach in your school/setting. 

If at some point your setting applies to Step 5 of the Pathways to become a MiSP Beacon School, the Portfolio can be submitted to support your application.

In the Hub, click on the Pathways logo for each step and in the Portfolio templates at each Step level you will see suggested detailed actions/activities that will support introducing mindfulness in your setting.

• These ideas are just a suggested starting point and we welcome settings choosing other ways of getting things started.
• We recommend building the Pathways Portfolio on whichever platform is most suited to/already used by your setting, ie. Googledrive, Microsoft, Thinkific, Padlet etc.
• Feel free to use a range of different ways of recording evidence of the work you are doing; for example:- photos, videos, audio interviews (please get permissions for sharing any photographs or videos of students or staff), written work, artwork, displays, Class Impact survey results, staff questionnaires, research, policy documents, certificates or other evidence to show related CPD (for example, attending MiSP support sessions; retreats, group mentoring, practice sessions, Schools Sits and Skills workshops) 

More detailed information for each Step is or will be available in the Hub. However, here is an idea of the sorts of evidence you could collect at each Step:

Step 1 – Explore – Evidence of research using undertaken i.e. evidence of attendance at an information webinar, a Mindfulness in School action plan, a photo of attendance at a School Sit etc

Log in to the Hub and click here for Step 1 Resources 

Step 2– Introduce – Evidence of introductions to mindfulness for staff and students i.e. photos of student assembly on mindfulness using Step 2 resources, photo of a staff mindfulness display board, photo of a staff taster session, certificates of attendance of practice sessions, retreats, Step 2 Skills workshops etc

Log in to the Hub and click here for Step 2 Resources

Step 3 – Develop – Evidence of courses being offered to students i.e. photos or video clips of dots, Paws b or .b classes, photo of a student mindfulness display board, notes from Staff and/or Student mindfulness working groups, certificates of attendance or other evidence to show attending Group Mentoring sessions, Step 3 Skills workshops etc

Log in to the Hub and click here for Step 3 Resources

Step 4 – Embed – Evidence of courses being offered to staff, parents, governors and wider development work exploring how mindfulness approaches might inform/support other areas of school life i.e. photos of course, video clips of adults in setting talking about the benefits of mindfulness, policy documents that show influence of mindfulness approaches.

Also, evidence that the School Mindfulness Lead is supporting their own practice and development i.e. certificates of attendance or other evidence to show they are receiving supervision, attending Group Mentoring sessions, Step 4 Skills workshops, retreats etc. 

We hope this helps and, if you have any questions or further ideas for development, please contact enquiries@mindfulnessinschools.org.

Please join us on this journey by exploring ‘The Pathways’ today!

The post What is the MiSP Pathways Portfolio? appeared first on Mindfulness in Schools Project.

We are delighted to welcome Ken Lunn to our Board of Trustees!

 

Ken has substantial experience in senior IT roles up to director level in the NHS. Since retiring in 2014, he has trained as a mindfulness teacher and has taken leadership roles in two other charities, bringing his management experience to bear in developing these charities.

He would like to see mindfulness more pervasively available, widely used as a way of improving individual well-being and resilience, and he sees MiSP’s mission as critical in that aspiration.

The post MiSP Welcomes New Trustee appeared first on Mindfulness in Schools Project.

Making a Difference Locally launches
‘The Mindful Fund’ Supporting Wellbeing in Schools 

We are thrilled to share that Co-op Wholesale’s charity, Making a Difference Locally (MADL), has a brand-new funding initiative aimed at supporting wellbeing in schools. The initiative will fund up to two members of staff per school to join the MiSP Pathways and train to deliver our curricula to the children and young people they work with!

The Mindful Fund will provide £50,000 for Co-op Wholesale retail partners to apply for grants to support a nominated individual in a local school to do our .begin course followed by either the Train to Teach dots, Paws b, or .b course, whichever is best suited to their setting. We recommend that two staff members from every school sign up to make this approach sustainable. If you are based in a Primary you can have one member of staff trained to teach dots for 3-6 year olds and the other Paws b for 7-11 year olds.

MiSP is so grateful to MADL and to our Ambassador Esther Ghey for her role in supporting this wonderful new opportunity, inspired by the positive results of the Peace in Mind campaign funding mindfulness teacher training for staff in Warrington schools.

The training equips educators with the tools to deliver mindfulness techniques in the classroom, helping young people to better manage stress, regulate emotions, and build resilience – essential skills in today’s challenging world.

The fund is open-ended and will remain available until all £50,000 has been allocated, which will enable 31 schools across the UK to benefit.

“We’re proud to be launching The Mindful Fund through our Making a Difference Locally charity. By investing in training for individuals within schools, we can create a ripple effect that supports the wellbeing of countless young people. This fund not only empowers our partners to support their communities but also helps us take meaningful action to address the growing challenges faced by young people today.”
Kate Carroll, Social Value Lead at Co-op Wholesale

MADL is organising the funding through Nisa partners who are encouraged to apply soon to secure a place for a local school before the fund is fully utilised.

N.B. If you are a school interested in MADL funding please contact your local Nisa store. Applications are only eligible through MADL and Co-op Wholesale retail partners.

For more information about the charity visit www.nisalocally.co.uk/community or follow @MADLCharity on Facebook, X or LinkedIn.

The post New Funding Available! appeared first on Mindfulness in Schools Project.

The Pathways model is a framework designed to help individuals, schools and educational settings explore the benefits of mindfulness and clearly see the extent of MiSP’s potential support. Please see our at-a-glance Pathways Model infographic.

MiSP has previously launched the Pathways framework and the Step 1 and Step 2 resources, which focused on exploring what mindfulness in education is and training staff in an 8-week course.

We are delighted to now announce that the Step 3 resources are ready and are available in the Hub as part of the Pathways framework!

Step 3 focuses on developing a model for mindfulness taught in-house to students and building a community to share coordination of mindfulness initiatives. Anyone who has already completed a Train to Teach dots, Paws b, .b or The Present course and is a Hub Member can automatically access Step 3 resources via the Hub.

For anyone looking to move from Step 2 to Step 3 of the Pathways, we recommend completing a Train to Teach students course. This could be through joining a Train to Teach:

• dots (Age 3-6) course
• Paws b (Age 7-11) course
• .b (Age 11-18) course
• The Present (Age 3-12) course

Why mindfulness for children and young people and how Step 3 resources support?

Alongside other interventions, mindfulness can play a part in both improving the wellbeing of students and, in turn, supporting a whole school approach to flourishing.

Research shows us that students learning mindfulness can have a positive impact on a variety of outcomes for children and young people, including mental health, social and emotional skills, cognition and learning, wellbeing, behaviour and physical health. The field is growing rapidly and overall the evidence suggests that well-designed and well-conducted mindfulness interventions show moderate to small impacts. We have learned from a few large studies that care should be taken to develop a mindfulness approach slowly as part of a whole school approach to wellbeing and that it is essential to have interested, well-trained and well-supported staff delivering the teaching to students. MiSP’s Pathways framework provides CPD-style follow on training to teachers who initially train with us, enabling them to continue to develop their mindfulness teaching skills and connect with a larger supportive community of mindfulness practitioners and teachers.

As well as completing a Train to Teach students course, this initial training can be further sustained with the help of MiSP’s programme of ongoing support and training through the Pathways. With the aim of cultivating and nurturing personal practice alongside exploring how mindfulness might support us in our working life and our approach to working with children and young people, MiSP offers Hub members support across the Pathways, including now at Step 3 e.g:

• Train to Teach Group Mentoring
• Step 3 Skills workshops – including Adapting the Curricula, Trauma-Informed Practice workshops

Please note, Hub membership is open to anyone who has taken a .begin, .b Foundations or other recognised 8-week course, enabling them to access Step 2 resources. Step 3 resources are for people who have completed a Train to Teach course – for details of how to become a Hub member, please see here.

Keys to successful implementation and how Step 3 resources support?

Developing a mindfulness approach in a setting can start with a passionate teacher or other educational member of staff. MiSP looks to use its expertise and experience to support such teachers and educational staff with creating the best conditions for developing a sustainable model for implementing mindfulness in their setting.

Research conducted by Stephanie Wilde et al in 2019, for instance, showed that there are certain key factors in the successful implementation of mindfulness in schools, including:

1. Understanding that the implementation process usually takes time
2. Having a shared supportive ethos/climate ideally to begin with
3. Developing, over time, a shared language about mindfulness
4. Enabling students and staff to be well informed about what mindfulness is (and isn’t)

You will see, therefore, that for Step 3 we have provided resources to support educational staff in further developing a shared language and understanding about mindfulness with students in their community. These include:

• Crib sheets to support the training offered in the Step 3 Skills Workshops alongside attending the workshops themselves
• Ideas and resources for continuing practice development for students (and staff)
• Resources for starting a Mindfulness Club and starting a Mindfulness Leaders group, beginning steps for enabling student voice as part of the approach
• Reflective tools, including a portfolio sheet, with activities and suggestions for how you can grow and develop the setting’s mindfulness approach

Please note, if you would like to introduce mindfulness to students but don’t yet have any teachers or educational staff ‘in house’ trained to teach MiSP student courses in your setting, please consider finding a trained teacher in your area via our Trained Teacher Maps.

A reminder of resources for Steps (4 & 5) still to come

Launching one step at a time over the next year will also be the following Steps with their primary focus marked in bold:

• Step 4 – Embed mindfulness learning and approaches throughout the setting
  where appropriate.
• Step 5 – Sustain and Share, further ensuring your mindfulness approaches
  are as sustainable as possible and can also be shared with and inspire others
  through becoming a MiSP Beacon School/Setting/Trust.

Finally – why approach mindfulness in this way?

Since 2009, MiSP has had the privilege of working with a wide variety of schools, other educational settings, Local Education Authorities and Multi Academy Trusts, helping them to support the wellbeing and mental health of both young people and adults who work within them, as well as the broader community of families, governing bodies, other service providers and volunteers who support those schools.

We have collated examples of successful implementation of mindfulness-based initiatives and key learning from where things have not quite gone to plan. The Pathways approach has evolved out of this rich learning. The benefits of ‘The Pathways’ model include a clear but flexible structure, expert support, tried and tested resources, and a collaborative model that encourages participation from staff and students.

Ultimately, our goal is to empower schools and communities to bring mindfulness to the heart of educational life, supporting individual and community wellbeing. We welcome feedback and the Pathways framework has been designed to evolve in response to our community’s needs.

If you have any questions or further ideas for development, please contact enquiries@mindfulnessinschools.org.

Please join us on this journey by exploring ‘The Pathways’ today!

The post Launching the Pathways Step 3 appeared first on Mindfulness in Schools Project.

When and how does mindfulness practice show up in your day? 

I view mindfulness like a light switch – you can choose to turn it on / off. As the day goes on, it’s so much easier to turn it off and get lost in my thoughts or some other distraction that takes me from the present moment. I constantly have to make a conscious choice throughout the day to turn the switch on and come back to the present moment. I do this by tuning in and being intentional with my breath, noticing a physical sensation, taking in my surroundings, or simply being present with a child – engaging with them in real time. When I drift into my thoughts, I try my best to be aware of this and acknowledge that I am making this choice. I love the analogy of a “thought bus” or “cloud” and I try my best to view my passing thoughts with this lens. Sometimes mindfulness shows up more formally in my day. Every morning I dedicate around 30 minutes to go through a series of yoga poses that allow me to stretch, prepare my body and breath for the day, and just check in with myself and how I’m feeling physically. Sometimes I slip into autopilot and go through the motions but I try my best to stay present with my body or breath. I follow this practice with a seated meditation that takes on different forms depending on how I’m feeling energetically. Sometimes I do a calming breathing practice where I focus on the counting of my breath and where I feel it in my body. Sometimes I do a more strenuous breathing exercise for strength & focus. Other times I just sit and talk to myself. If done with attention and by choice, they can all nourish me in different ways.

If you reflect back on the day, where are the moments you have awareness of choices?

When making choices throughout my day I try my best to tune in to what feels right when responding. When I am in a state of reacting, I tend to feel a sense of discomfort – there’s a bit of tension in my body, my heart beats a little faster, and I may feel a little flush. My biggest indicator however is a tingling sensation at the top of my head. That’s usually a clue that I need to pause, tune in with my breath, and allow things to unfold a bit more before responding. When I’m responding it’s usually because there’s a sense of ease and choices feel natural – there’s a sense of flow. I try my best to stay fluid in this current of waiting to respond versus reacting. Sometimes I have to make choices about the future, etc… In these moments I have to really dig into my practice to wait and respond versus reacting. I know the future will unfold as it’s meant to unfold but I must notice the choices as they appear along the way that help bring this future to fruition. There is a real sense of surrender to the future. This can be really exciting but also daunting and practices that keep me in the present help me stay focused on the footsteps I’m currently taking that will take me where I need to go.

What about noticing after the moment; if you didn’t make skilful choices during the day? 

In these moments, I rely heavily on reflection. I reflect on the choices I didn’t feel so comfortable about. Sometimes I write out what happened and other times I talk it out with someone. A lot of the time I participate in an internal dialogue or visualize what happened during moments of meditation. All avenues give me an opportunity to think about what happened, the choices that were made, and overall how it made me or others feel. I try and think about some of the other ways I could have responded and how everything feels, narrowing in on ways I should have responded. I try my best not to be too hard on myself knowing that skilful choices can now be made only after knowing what choices not to make. There is a real sense of learning that I welcome by bringing awareness to the less than perfect choices.

What’s your go to practice in the midst of a working day?

Coming back to my breath is my absolute go-to practice as well as choosing to be present with a child in the form of play or noticing together in the moment.

Coming back to my breath nourishes me and allows me to connect with myself while connecting with a child allows me to connect with something outside of myself.

What else supports your health and wellbeing? 

In order to support my health and well-being I stretch and do yoga, swim, lift light weights, listen to music, clean, cook, and take hot showers. Being outside or in nature really fills my cup and playing in the ocean waves gives me life. Getting an appropriate amount of sleep and setting limits on screen time also support my wellbeing.

Being present with these activities makes them come to life in ways that feel good to me.

Call to action? 

The purpose of life is to know who you are. First you must know what you are not. Practice being present, surrender to each moment as it comes, believe in yourself, and keep going. In time you will know true peace.

Our huge thanks to Brock for all his hard work and for sharing this with us.

The post MiSP A Day in the Life of Brock Martin appeared first on Mindfulness in Schools Project.

Guest blog by Eli

I’m a 22-year-old studying Chemistry at the University of Bristol. Like many other students (and, I suspect, many non-students), I’ve often felt overwhelmed, stressed, and anxious. Although I still experience these emotions, mindfulness and the .begin course have given me the tools to deal with, understand and accept these feelings.

Although my memory of the time is fuzzy, my journey with mindfulness began in 2013 when my Dad began to practice, and eventually teach mindfulness. Throughout my childhood, I participated in various different activities including two family retreats, a young person’s retreat and MiSP’s own Paws b and .b programs. While it may seem that this consistent exposure would give me a bias towards mindfulness, I actually spent most of my life questioning its effectiveness and believing it was just another fad. It was only in September last year (2023) that I began practising and saw the true benefits that mindfulness can provide.

So what changed?

Last summer, part way through a trip around Europe, my parents informed me over the phone that my sister had an unidentified mass in her arm which could have been cancer. This instantly triggered a flood of anxieties and fears. Not only was I deeply worried about my sister, but a wave of repressed trauma from when my mum had cancer resurfaced.

This led to me cutting my trip short, flying home, and spending the next month shut away being consumed by anxiety and depression. By the time September arrived, and I had to return to Bristol for my third year, the combination of university stress, fear for my sister’s health and it taking three months to discover that it wasn’t cancer, and the resurgence of buried emotions led to me having what I can only describe as a breakdown. I felt powerless and unsure of how to regain control over my life. It was at this time that my Dad told me that there was space on a .begin course if I wanted to give mindfulness another shot. Despite my previous doubts I figured that I had nothing to lose, and as a last-ditch effort to pull myself out of a downward spiral, I joined the course.

I want to be clear here: the .begin course didn’t magically eliminate my anxiety and solve all of my problems. Instead, it gave me a toolkit to understand and deal with the negative thoughts and feelings I was experiencing. Throughout the course we were introduced to a variety of techniques, and while not all of them resonated with me, that was okay. We were consistently taught that not everything works for everyone, and to practice the techniques which work for you – whether it’s body scans, “pausing and stepping back exercises”, or reframing your thoughts. One particular concept that struck a chord for me was the idea of thinking about your life as a movie—where you step back and watch it unfold without getting lost in it. It might sound strange, but for me this simple idea provided a foundation that allowed me to begin pulling myself out of the downward spiral.

Since finishing the course I’ve found that being mindful has shifted my relationship with anxiety and stress. Rather than seeing these feelings as problems to solve, I now view them as part of my experience and find that I can manage them with patience and kindness toward myself. Moving forward, I’d like to deepen my practice. Although I haven’t yet fully committed to a daily formal practice, I know mindfulness will continue to be a valuable resource in my life.

The key takeaway for me is that mindfulness doesn’t provide a magical one-size-fits-all solution, but rather a flexible toolkit to approach life’s challenges with. If you’re considering the .begin course, I encourage you to give it a try. Even if you’re sceptical like I was, .begin offers an accessible introduction to mindfulness and there’s a good chance you’ll find something that resonates with you. Mindfulness won’t solve all your problems, but it can help you approach them with more clarity, acceptance, and patience—and that’s a powerful shift in itself.

The post My journey with mindfulness: why I took the .begin course and why you should too appeared first on Mindfulness in Schools Project.

We would love to see you there online or in person. If you are unable to attend on the day, we have heard from the organisers that a recording will be available if you have signed up for a pass.

The workshops are in collaboration with key contributors to the field of mindfulness in education: 

(Left to right)

• Richard Burnett (Co-Founder of MiSP)
• Esther Ghey (Director of Peace in Mind)
• Faiy Rushton (Education Training and Development Manager for MiSP)
• Sarah Silverton (Director of The Present Courses CIC)
• Emily Slater (CEO of MiSP) 
• Jason Steele (Founder and CEO of Raise the Youth)
• Professor Katherine Weare

Plus a chance to hear from the children and young people who are benefitting.

We are excited to be sharing:

• The latest research overview from Professor Katherine Weare

• Insights from children and young people themselves

• An overview of lessons learnt in the development of school-based mindfulness

• MiSP’s new framework for educational communities offering diverse entry points and a range of paths to introduce and sustain mindfulness in your settings and intentionally develop a whole school culture that embodies the values, qualities and attitudes of mindfulness.

• Esther Ghey will be joining us with reflections on her recent inspirational work, to fund the mindfulness training of a teacher in every school in her late daughter Brianna’s home town of Warrington, as well as raise awareness of mindfulness with media and decision makers. 

Plus:

• Experience tasters of MiSP’s newest curriculum for 3-6 year olds and The Present for Schools, with an opportunity to hear directly from The Present Director and curriculum author, Sarah Silverton, as part of sharing a new official collaboration between the two organisations.  

We would love to see you there!

Until now, International Conference on Mindfulness (ICM) conference organisers needed people to commit to all 5 days. However, there is now the option to attend the MiSP-facilitated day only, either via livestream (£50) or in person (£100).  Please note your ticket can be used for one of three workshops that day and “Mindfulness for Future Generations'”is the MiSP-facilitated one to select.

TUESDAY 6th August 2024, 9am for 9.30am-5pm (UK time)

The post Join us at the International Conference on Mindfulness 2024 appeared first on Mindfulness in Schools Project.

Guest blog by Zettie Taylor, Teacher of English & Mindfulness at Princes Risborough School 

One of our Year 7 students told me: “Me and a friend went to our lockers to get our laptops out for our next lesson and the locker doors would not open. We were trying as hard as we could but the doors were not opening so we went to the office but no one was there – we were freaking out! So we did petal practice and finger breathing and it worked! Turns out that the key was the wrong way. Our minds were clear which meant that we could look at the key a different way.”

I love this anecdote. By unlocking new perspectives, mindfulness offers us different ways of approaching life. I have reams of feedback from students in my school, reporting on the many ways that mindfulness ‘works’ for them. Nine out of ten of our Year 7s have said that it helps, so it came as a shock to hear the results of the MYRIAD study. As I have reflected on the gap between the data at our school and the MYRIAD project, I wonder whether perhaps something about the study itself was somehow ‘turning the key the wrong way’.

Where did it all start?

I feel fortunate to have stumbled across the MYRIAD project at the start of my mindfulness journey. With their funding, we were able to offer fifteen staff members an MBCT for life, and train four of us to teach the .b (pronounced “Dot Be”) 11-18 year olds course to our students.

Learning to teach mindfulness was the hardest thing I’d done since training as a teacher ten years previously. It requires a shift in perspective and expectation, and a delicate balance to maintain between classroom management and personal freedom. I was so keen, so passionate about sharing these fantastic techniques to help our students to self regulate, yet so inexperienced – the mistakes I made on our MYRIAD study students were, well, myriad. I tried so hard to get it right! The training, which was designed to protect the integrity of the study by ensuring that individual teachers didn’t deviate too far from the MiSP script, was definitely gold standard – yet in some ways it held me back. The limitations imposed by the study overrode my professional instinct to respond to different students’ needs, and it’s taken the last seven years of teaching Dot Be and Paws Be at PRS for me to develop my authentic ‘voice’.

I’ve learned from my mistakes over time, letting go of the need to control the outcome and relaxing into a more invitational style of teaching. I learned early on that appearances can be deceptive: quiet students who seem to be engaged can be thinking all sorts of mutinous thoughts, while the disruptive ones often (secretly) report the most gains. One lively student succinctly summed up their experience of mindfulness as “boring as f**k but I still want to do it”! The traditional teacher in me might jump on the swearing; the newer one embraces the honesty in this, and the courage. We can learn to ‘turn the key’ in different ways for different students, with acceptance, humour and respect for each student’s perspective

Developing mindfulness to suit our students

Over the years I have adjusted the delivery of mindfulness in the PRS curriculum to better suit our students. We have moved from teaching the .b course to Year 8s through Wednesday afternoon Enrichment, to teaching the Paws b 7-11 year olds course to our Year 7s within the PSHE curriculum. I’ve shared the .b course with parents, and taught it to Year 11s keen enough to attend after school on a Friday. Some decisions are practical, but I’ve learned to trust my instincts regarding what approach will best meet the needs of our young people.

While I remain true to the intentions and outcomes of the MiSP courses, I now deliver them in my own ‘voice’. As my personal practice develops and changes over the years, I find myself offering more choices. “If you don’t find the breath a helpful place to rest your attention, you can always tune in to your hands or feet instead.” After the death of my father in 2020, I better understand how trauma can affect someone practising mindfulness. For a year afterwards, turning inwards felt like peering into an abyss; it was frightening – and I finally understood why some children might prefer to disturb others rather than sit quietly. I learned to be gentle with myself, and bring that outlook to the classroom too. A belief that teaching mindfulness to young people is a process of planting seeds helps. If presented with a light touch, a student may rediscover mindfulness in later years when challenges arise.

Mindfulness has benefitted me too

Teaching mindfulness has benefitted me, too. Working with young people keeps it fresh. A daily practice helped me to balance my roles as a mother and a teacher by understanding my own stress signature. I discovered that the more busy I was, the less in touch I became with my own body. I learned to spot the signs of overwhelm much earlier. Mindfulness was the process by which I came to know myself better – and then it gave me the strength to hold steady when everything changed.

For over two years now I have lived with Long Covid, and I have come to embrace both the limitations and the possibilities of this chronic condition. I regularly tune in to my body and accept what I find, responding to fatigue and pain with compassion rather than denial. In the darkest days, when I was unable to teach, I knew I had a toolkit of practices and experience – I could ‘turn the key a different way’ and unlock a new perspective. Now I am grateful for the freedom Long Covid has given me to create breathing space in a life that had become increasingly overloaded. I know myself better, check in regularly, and make wiser choices about where I direct my energy.

So, where next?

I am keen to expand the breadth of mindfulness practice across our academy trust. I have successfully embedded an introduction to mindfulness within our Year 7 curriculum at PRS with the Paws b course. We sometimes start department meetings with a brief practice to help us change gear, which is always well received – but currently I am the only mindfulness teacher in the school. My recent absence from work has reminded me that there is strength in numbers.

I have delivered a taster session at a recent wellbeing conference run by Insignis Academy Trust, and I am trained and ready to offer an 8 week adult mindfulness course (.b Foundations) to other staff within our cluster of five schools. Offering mindfulness to adult stakeholders could start to weave a mindful way of teaching and being into the wider fabric of the school communities, perhaps leading to more teachers training to teach our students. More practitioners would enable us to offer interested students a chance to revisit mindfulness with the .b course in Key Stage 4 and 5 as the exam pressures build.

I am learning to embrace the fact that I can’t do it all myself, and that change takes time. I regularly remind school leaders of the positive impact of mindfulness on our students, using my growing bank of feedback gathered via Google forms through optional mindfulness homeworks and an end of course assessment. I need to be flexible and creative in finding ways around the restrictions of school budgets, and time. With more trained staff, we can bring mindfulness training to parents and other stakeholders, too. I dream of a team of mindfulness teachers modelling a slower, more considered way of living and working – and reaping personal rewards through the process.

I’m grateful to the MYRIAD project for giving me the start I needed on this journey. So many of the young people in our school tell me that mindfulness techniques have helped them to overcome their daily challenges in a world of increasing uncertainty. Our current education system seems to be hard to access for so many students.

What if mindfulness is part of the answer? It certainly helps us to ‘look at the key a different way’.

Read the Princes Risborough Case Study here

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