Cultivating Mindfulness in the Classroom by Jeanie M. Iberlin

Author:Jeanie M. Iberlin
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Marzano Research
Published: 2020-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

Strategies for Managing Overwhelming and Negative Emotions

In order to help students control their emotions, educators can teach strategies to that end and have students practice these strategies in the classroom. The following sections detail three activities to help students develop greater emotional control: (1) watching one’s thoughts, (2) internalizing the positive, and (3) naming and taming one’s emotions.

Watching One’s Thoughts

Part of emotional control involves being aware of but not consumed by one’s moods: “When unhappiness or stress hovers overhead, rather than taking it all personally, you learn to treat them as if they were black clouds in the sky, and to observe them with friendly curiosity as they drift past” (Williams & Penman, 2011, p. 5). In essence, mindfulness allows practitioners to catch negative thought patterns before they become all-consuming. Mindfulness is not about changing all of one’s negative thoughts to positive ones. Rather, it encourages observing the thoughts without getting ensnared by them.

Watching one’s thoughts involves teaching students a simple four-step process for disconnecting from negative emotions (Divine, 2014): (1) notice the negative thought or feeling, (2) use a power statement to interrupt negativity, (3) replace negativity with positive self-talk and visualization, and (4) reinforce the positive mental state with a power statement or pose. Teaching students that the thoughts that float through their minds are not the thoughts they necessarily need to entertain can help them better manage their feelings, such as those of self-doubt or anxiety. Consider the following three elements: (1) preparation, (2) essential learnings, and (3) directions.

Preparation

Teachers can prepare for this fifteen- to thirty-minute activity by coming up with example power statements, power poses, and situations in which students might use this process. It’s important to discuss with students the idea that everyone has negative thoughts that come and go throughout the day. It’s where a person puts his or her focus that matters.

Essential Learnings

In addition to the process for replacing negative thinking, students can be made aware of the following information so that they understand the purpose of this activity.

• Mindfulness is not about pretending people don’t have negative thoughts. However, mindfulness is about witnessing and letting go of one’s negative thoughts.

• Not all thoughts are worthy of one’s attention and energy.

• People have the power to catch their negative feelings and interrupt them before they are overwhelmed by them.

• Replacing negative thinking with empowering thoughts helps people be successful in stressful situations. This technique is even used by U.S. Navy SEALs (Divine, 2014).

Directions

The following four steps outline the discussions associated with this activity.

1. Invite students to think of times when they are vulnerable to negative thinking. This may be when they are tired, uncomfortable, in a new situation, or feeling alone. Pose the following discussion question or a similar one: Instead of allowing negativity to catch you off guard in these situations, what might noticing negativity look like, sound like, and feel like?

2. Once negative thinking has been noticed, it can be stopped through the use of power statements. Some power statements include phrases such as “I can do this,” “I am powerful,” and “I love a challenge.

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