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| photo courtesy Elizabeth McAvoy |
Elizabeth McAvoy has more than 20 years’ experience working as an educator and professional mentor to at-risk youth. She currently teaches middle school Art and English Language Development in San Francisco, California, where she uses mindfulness to help her students self-calm and increase attention, focus, and compassion for self and others. She is the co-author (with Jacqueline Thousand) of the laminated guide Mindfulness for Teachers and Students.
Lately I’ve been featuring resources for adolescents and young children, so I’m quite interested in your perspective as a middle school teacher. What are the most effective mindfulness practices and activities for the ‘tween’ age group?
Every student
comes to class with different needs. As a teacher, I continually tune in to the
dynamic and energy of the room to determine how to best engage the students in
learning. Inserting a mindfulness practice into the schedule is no different;
different groups benefit most from different practices.
The first year I
consciously implemented mindful techniques, I was teaching in a self-contained
classroom. At that time, I had begun doing research for a thesis on
mindfulness, so we tried a lot of the techniques I was reading about, including
most of the practices in the laminated guide. (Others, like the Waterfall Relaxation
Meditation and Glitter Bottle, were done with younger groups I had taught in
the past).
Year two I taught English Language Arts and Social Studies to two
groups of sixth graders and a seventh-grade class. The sixth graders liked
having a minute of silence to support their transition from a busy four-minute
break. The seventh graders needed a bit more; they came to me right after taking
PE and before breaking for lunch. They came into the classroom full of energy
and most likely hungry.
As soon as the bell signaled the beginning of class, I
rang a chime and had them put their heads down and/or close their eyes, then we
meditated in silence or did a guided meditation using the apps listed in the
resource section of Mindfulness for Teachers and Students. Each student
had personal favorites, and about half of them favored the six-minute Focus meditation
offered on Headspace. This meditation asks students to listen to a tone from
its beginning until it fades into silence.
This year I am
teaching art, a subject which naturally lends itself to being mindful. I
started out by having each of my classes meditate in silence for a minute, but
after a couple of weeks I realized that the very act of creating art put most
of the students into a meditative, focused state. Since most of them hadn't had
any formal training in art techniques, getting them to really observe colors,
shapes, lines, and textures is an exercise in being mindful.
Last week we worked on one-point perspective
drawings of our school hallways, and the all the students, including those with
behavior contracts, became utterly focused on recreating the lines that
comprised the hallways, lockers, and doors. This makes sense to me, since I
have always personally credited art with being the fastest and most dependable
portal into a calm and focused state.
For me, it's
important to be very familiar with the subject matter before I teach it. I’m a
first-year art teacher, and I create every piece of art before I teach it to
the kids. I gather the materials I think I'll need, pour the paint the way I
think I'll want them to pour it, experiment with different brushes and brush
strokes, and take notes on what works and what doesn't work. It's the same with
meditation. Before I began consciously bringing mindfulness into the classroom,
I needed to feel like I knew what I was doing and had benefited from it.
I created Mindfulness for Teachers and Students to help me remember all of my favorite
techniques. It offers an intro to mindfulness and many exercises -- such as how
to use the senses to be mindful -- that would be suitable for those who are
unfamiliar with the practice. Those who have a background in mindfulness may
use the guide as a refresher and an introduction to new techniques. The world
is full of opportunities to be mindful – the guide highlights a few that have
worked especially well in my classroom.
I haven't heard
anything from parents and I don't specifically address the practice when I'm
talking to them about our classroom. For me, it is simply another tool in my
classroom management toolkit. It is not so much of a spiritual practice as a
scientifically proven way to increase impulse control, heighten attention, and
reduce anxiety. I use neutral, non-spiritual terms to explain to students why
we sit in silence.
I might introduce a guided meditation by saying the
following,
"Today we're going to sit in silence and listen to a tone from its beginning until it fades into silence. Our minds are probably going to be full of thoughts and feelings, and we might find ourselves thinking about something else and not paying attention to the sound. When we notice that this has happened, we'll just gently bring our attention back to the sound. Our brains are busy, so we may need to do this many times. That's o.k. This is a good exercise for our brain because it teaches the brain to stay focused and it helps the brain calm down."
Students notice the difference, and I imagine
some parents do, too. I recently asked the students to write me a note to let
me know whether they've used a "mindful minute" outside of the
classroom. Almost every student had. Some examples of places the students said
they were using meditation were in the bus, while in line at a store, during
the credits in a movie, and while their video games were loading.
You’ve taught
in Costa Rica and South Korea. How has
living and working in different cultures influenced you as a teacher?
I've spent much of my adulthood
seeking knowledge and new experiences along with my place in the world. But, as
cliché as it is, I now realize my connection to everything around me was there no
matter where I was.
Over the past few years I've gradually woken up to the fact
that I've had a really full life with so many opportunities, but because I
lived so much of it on autopilot, I missed a lot of it.
This understanding has
been very motivating to me. I want to be present for the remainder of my life,
one mindful moment at a time. Being mindful is the key to making this
happen.
What does
‘mindful teaching’ mean to you?
I began
practicing mindfulness after a health breakdown that occurred after years of
working with some of California's most high-needs, at-risk youth. While out on
medical leave, I tried a variety of methods to heal myself, such as eliminating
sugar and processed flour, acupuncture, massage, and different kinds of meditation.
I noticed the most benefit from a 12-week mindfulness group that met at a
medical center. I had been at a crossroads in my career, but I began to see that if I consistently applied mindfulness at work, I could return to the classroom and stay healthy while there.
Essentially, mindful teaching means catching myself when I’m in frantic autopilot mode, and switching over to a more conscious state of being. A bit of background: I have a temperament that might lead to me being described as: perfectionistic, anxious, too hard on myself... you get the idea. So, put me in a high-energy, dynamic classroom full of high-needs pre-teens for seven hours per day, and if I'm on autopilot, burnout is inevitable.
However, with consistent mindfulness, I can become aware of when I'm frantic, or when I'm not taking the time to sip water or use the restroom. I can become aware of when I'm literally running around the classroom during lunch, trying to get through my entire to-do list in 35 minutes.
The reality is that the to-do list is never going to be empty, and I can only do one thing at a time. One thing! This was an epiphany to me as a teacher, because when you're in charge of 25 to 30 young people who change out every 50 minutes for a total of about 160 individual beings, it seems like you have to multitask. But the fact of having one brain in one body is that you can only do one thing at a time, and that will just have to be good enough.
Now, when the students come in, I smile, look into their eyes, and greet each by name. In class I listen to one at a time as they work in groups. I implement the one-mic (one speaker at a time) rule in my classroom and I run my classroom as if all the students can just do one thing at a time, because if they are human like me, that's all they can do.
Now, when the students come in, I smile, look into their eyes, and greet each by name. In class I listen to one at a time as they work in groups. I implement the one-mic (one speaker at a time) rule in my classroom and I run my classroom as if all the students can just do one thing at a time, because if they are human like me, that's all they can do.
If I haven’t had water by the end of each period, I walk to my desk and take a sip or two. And if I need to use the restroom between classes, I walk down the hall and use it. I still have the same basic temperament, but I catch myself lapsing into that frantic mode far less often. The result is that I sleep more soundly, get sick less often, and simply enjoy my job and my life. This is far more important than trying to complete the impossible-to-complete to-do list.
Almost every day I go to work at least 20
minutes early, lock the door, and meditate for 15 to 20 minutes. At night, I
often fall asleep to the voice of a guided meditation.
What do you
do in your own personal mindfulness practice, and how does it help you with
your work?
When I feel too busy to
sit in silence for 20 minutes, I could either run around and work myself up
into a state of insanity, then go to bed and let the thoughts keep running
around and keeping me up half the night, or I can find 30 minutes to give my brain
and body a break, knowing from experience that after the break I will work more
efficiently and get more done, without the franticness. It just has to be
attempted and practiced to be believed.
When I don’t do it, I forget that my
brain has a life of its own, and that it will work me to illness unless my
conscious mind steps in and says hey, I need a break. It's like the flight
attendants say, in case of emergency, I need to put the oxygen mask on myself
first, or I'll be useless to give oxygen to anyone else. Only these days, I
don't wait for an emergency.
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