The Multiple Benefits of Exercise and Why We Need it as Educators.

As educators every school year is comparable to a Marathon. We start out happy and excited for what this year’s race will bring. Together packed in with our fellow educators we rush forward towards our personal and professional goals and aspirations. Then…. just like in a Marathon, we hit the wall and question if we can really finish this race. For educators (and especially those that work in Special Education) that “wall” comes right after Christmas when the 12 weeks of intervention wraps up, IEPs are due, requests for evaluations pile up and parents and teachers start to worry if all their efforts will help that struggling student pass the CRCT. These are the times when we feel like we want to give up and drop out of the race. However, it is at precisely these times of doubt we have to push forward and dig deep. We must take one thing at a time- putting one foot in front of the other until we reach the finish line. How, one may ask, can we do this if we want nothing more than to give up? According to John J. Ratey M.D., the answer may very well be exercise.

In his eye opening book Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise, John Ratey elegantly lays out the science of exercise and how it can beat stress, lift your mood, fight memory loss, and sharpen your intellect- simply by elevating your heart rate and breaking a sweat.  Exercise, he says, has many of the same neurobiological affects that prescription medication has including boosting levels of serotonin and norepinephrine. These are important neurotransmitters as they are believed to be responsible for regulating our mood and well-being (serotonin, dopamine) and increasing attention and focus (norepinephrine). By exercising we are better equipped to focus on what needs to get done and do it in a positive manner.

Exercise also appears to have a positive result on our ability to recover from stress and bounce back from the biological effects the stress-response has at the cellular level. It stimulates cell recovery, which may have been stripped down from over activation of our “fight or flight response.” This idea is truly groundbreaking as it highlights the neuroplasticity of the brain as well as the ability to activate neurogenesis (brain cell growth). The main player in this neurogenesis appears to be a protein called brain-derived neurotrophic factor, or BDNF, which is known to promote the health of nerve cells. It is responsible for maintenance and preservation of nerve cells. It can be compared to the Department of Transportation (DOT) fixing potholes, paving new roads and building highways in our brain (only much more efficient). What Ratey shows through research study after research study is that chronic stress appears to wear down the cells in our Hippocampus which is responsible for learning and memory. With as little as thirty minutes of exercise levels of BDNF elevate in the brain and study participants do better on cognitive test of memory and learning. Further, BDNF also appear to be responsible for combating the degenerative effects of stress in the Hippocampus that leads to depression and anxiety.

According to Dr. Ratey, adding exercise to your lifestyle “sparks your brain function to improve learning on three levels: First, it optimizes your mind-set to improve alertness, attention, mood, and motivation; Second, it prepares and encourages nerve cells to bind to one another, which is the cellular basis for logging in new information; and Third, it spurs the development of new nerve cells from stem cells in the Hippocampus.”  So next time you feel like you want to drop out of the race due to feeling overwhelmed try to find time to go for a short bike ride, walk or participate in a sports activity. It may give you the energy you need to finish out the school year and complete those last few miles in your professional marathon.

More information can be found at Dr. Ratey’s website, http://sparkinglife.org  where partnerships are being developed to increase the role of physical fitness in schools, hospitals and businesses to increase personal well-being and mental health. 

Interesting Links

As a School Psychologist I think is imperative to stay informed regarding research, current events and the current psycho-educational zeitgeist. I keep a word document on my computer with all the links I didn't get around to reading from the previous day. Yesterday, I started to realize that the document was growing out of control so I took some time out to catch up  on some reading. Here are some interesting tidbits from what I found.

• A recent study pretty much confirms what most Educators have already suspected: Children's school performance correlates with parent income and education levels. However, what makes this study so interesting is that these correlations are based on differences in volume of key brains regions - like the Hippocampus and Amygdala- which are involved in learning and processing emotions. You can start the obligatory is it the "chicken or the egg?" discussion below. One of my favorite books points out that parent income levels and stress levels often have prenatal consequences before environmental factors can even impact neonatal development. 

• It looks like a school district in San Diego that offers free Yoga classes to it's students twice a week are under fire from parents who believe this amounts to indoctrination into Hinduism and a violation of "separation of church and state." Along with this being a completely ridiculous argument, I also think it opens a "Pandora's box" with regards to the mindfulness and Yoga movement that has yet to really been ironed out in education, i.e. how comfortable is the "Mindfulness in Education" movement in becoming a secular movement. I have been meaning to write an entire post dedicated to this discourse but keep procrastinating. Stay posted for that. In the mean time here is a post called "Occupy Mindfulness" that got me thinking about the coming storm of traditionalist vs secularists. Then another one stressing that religion is not part of Yoga in schools. #foodforthought 

• Here is a great interview with Christopher Willard, which deals with some of the themes I mentioned in the previous bullet. If you teach mindfulness or meditation to children in schools, it is a great read and highlights the importance of finding balance between religious philosophy and secular pragmatics. 

• I found inspiration from this post  as I often struggle with negative thoughts which I label as "realistic." However, what I have come to realize is that focusing on the positive (which in not always reality) creates a better feeling within you, and  also makes one better equipped to deal with the inevitable "sturm and drang" of the human condition. These ten easy steps are great ways to stay positive and "keep it moving." 

• Here are a bunch of benefits to meditation from the APA. 

• Here is a nice "Mindfulness 101" post. I remember when I first started practicing Mindfulness I found it to be an abstract concept that was difficult to explain to others. I also had trouble practically labeling something that really ends up being a state of mind. I think the more one reads basic definitions of Mindfulness from others, they not only crystallize their own Mindfulness practice but they also become more fluent and comfortable explaining it to others.... so read away!

• I love www.edudemic.com. Its a great website that helps educators and schools incorporate technology and social media into their classrooms.  I also love Twitter. Here is a link combining both. As educators we have a responsibility to spread knowledge. We must gain knowledge through growth and study. Creating our own personal learning network is a great way of doing that. This list will help you know who are best to follow when creating a personal learning network on Twitter. P.S. Follow ME!! ;)

5 Ways for Teachers to increase Mindful Awareness in the Classroom

As Mindfulness in schools goes mainstream, new and practical ways of classroom integration continue to be explored and enjoyed by teachers. Increasing mindful awareness in classrooms can help reduce teacher and student stress, increase attention and focus and foster social emotional competence. Although not a full mindfulness program, teachers can implement these quick and easy mindful based activities into their daily routine in order to help foster the awareness that comes from a full mindfulness practice. The following 5 activities can be implemented throughout the day in order to help students transfer between activities, de-stress after a test, and refocus after an exciting project or experiment. Although created for elementary age students, these ideas could easily be revised for high school or college age students as well.



1. Mindful Minutes- Mindful Breathing is the foundation of any Mindful practice and should be the first thing that is taught to children. This technique is best taught by teaching children to focus on a sound, then slowly transfer their attention to their own breathing. A mindfulness bell is a great way of transitioning between a sound and  breathing. By focusing on breathing children "anchor" themselves in the moment and focus inward. If you cannot find a mindfulness bell, a chime, triangle or singing bowl can also work. Once the sound goes away have the students focus on their breath for 1 "Mindful Minute". These Mindful Minutes can be included at any time of the day between any activity. It's especially good to start the day with a Mindful Minute or have one after coming back from lunch or recess. As children get better at focusing for the full minute you can increase the time to 2 minutes or 5 minutes.

2. Cool Down with Yoga- A simple series of Yoga poses are a great way to get children moving within a classroom and ground themselves in the moment. For teachers that are unfamiliar with Yoga there are a few classroom based Yoga programs that give more detail about how to infuse Yoga into a school setting such as Go Grounded Yoga, Yoga 4 Classrooms, and Yoga in My School. Learning a simple Sun Salutation and guiding your class through it, is a quick and easy way to get them moving and mindful of their bodies. Have your students focus on where their bodies are in space as well as how they feel after 1-2 rounds. Also encourage them to focus their attention on their breath, coordinating in and out breaths with each pose in the series. If there is not enough room to do sun salutations focus on some standing poses such as Tree, Mountain or Warrior. Here is the Grounded Flow Clock from the Go Grounded program which is a great visual to help student learn the classic sun salutation. A Yoga break is a great way to transition between activities and get kids blood flowing between long periods of sitting.

3. Mindful Seeing- This a great activity to build children's awareness and ability to sustain focused-attention. It helps children recognize the difference between just looking/labeling something vs. acknowledging/being aware of the personal experience of seeing something in its individuality. Mindful seeing can be accomplished with any object. I like using lemons. Grab about 6 different lemons and have your classroom break into 6 different groups. Assign each group a lemon and have them all look at the lemon very closely. Have them touch it, look for special bumps, notice the size and any individual characteristics. After five minutes collect all the lemons and put them in a basket. Shake the basket then pull out one lemon at a time and have each group try to decide if that is their lemon. This activity helps the children understand the multi-sensory aspects of memory as well as how we engage all of our senses during active observation.

4. Mindful Listening- As music lover I really enjoy this activity and often practice this on my own when I am listening to music or taking a walk. You can pick a children's song (there are a variety of children's songs out there) or a current song from the radio. Try to have the students actively listen to each instrument and melody in the song. It may be helpful to pause the music and hum the bass line, or the melody and then play the song again. Try to have the students focus on one particular part of the song and only that part of the song. For example the guitar may be playing a melody. Teach the students to recognize the guitar and focus on the guitar only. After a couple of minutes switch to another instrument. This is great activity to try during music class. Another listening activity that I enjoy is having students close their eyes and listen to the quiet room for thirty second. After thirty seconds have them list all the sounds that they came up with on the board. Try the same activity again and this time listen quietly in the room for a full minute. See if the class is able to  notice more sounds than before. This is a great activity to anchor students in the moment and practice focused attention and concentration.

5. Wishing Good Will-  Good will wishes are a great way to develop gratitude in your classroom as well as a positive classroom environment. Research has shown favorable results from positive affirmations as well as acknowledging gratitude. Positive Psychology is a growing field that touts neuroscience as support for the positive effects of optimism and other positive thoughts within a classroom setting. One activity to facilitate positivity and interconnectedness in the classroom is developing good will wishes. This can be completed by having students take a mindful minute (as stated above) and think about someone granting them one good will wish that can help someone else. They can send the wish to themselves silently saying "I wish that .....". Have them repeat the wish to themselves silently. Encourage them to notice how they feel when they say the wish. Next, after a minute or two, they can focus on a friend in the class or a family member. Send that person the wish and silently say " I wish that (person of choice)......" Again, encourage them to recognize how they feel when they wish good will to others. After about five minutes have them focus back on their breathing and slowly switch attention back to the classroom. These well wishes can be referred to throughout the day if disagreements arise. It is also a great way to start of the day or week.

By incorporating these ideas into their classrooms, teachers can begin to build mindful awareness and social emotional competence with their students. Although not a full curriculum, these activities can help to foster stress reduction and awareness. They can also help with transitions between activities and create a classroom culture that is ripe for learning. For more information regarding mindfulness in schools, refer to the following links:

• Mindful Schools
• Mindful Kids
• MindUP
• Association for Mindfulness in Education
• Tools For Peace

Infographic for Special Education

I guess it is Special Education month, although I had trouble finding any organization or proof that "National Special Education Month" exists. What I did find was this great infographic that takes a really nice look at special education and its numbers over the years.  If anyone knows why September is Special Education Month, let me know.

USC Rossier Online

SOURCE

Mindful Documentary and more links

• Great documentary about the work Mindful Schools is doing in the Bay Area.... love the way the girl looks at the bell the first time she hears it.

Room to Breathe Official Trailer from Russell Long on Vimeo.

• Interesting article about the effects of pot usage on the developing adolescent brain.

• Here is a great video showing how to incorporate mindful awareness and it links to memory using rocks (This again is apart of the awesome MIND UP curriculum)

• Are toddlers susceptible to peer pressure ?????

• Looks like schools in Memphis are finding success in meditation... maybe there is hope for the South.

• Interesting research regarding the different neural pathways activated during pleasure reading vs. critical reading

• A great quick intervention that I like to use for Anxiety

6 Ways of Increasing Comprehension using Social Media

I'm sitting in my office looking over email and trying to get ready for the day when the door bursts open. In comes a frustrated High School special education teacher 3-5 year away from retirement. Cue cliche:"Kids these days, they just don't care. Whatever I say they could care less", he stammers. Seeing that it clearly does not matter to him that I may be in the middle of doing work, I put on my consultant cap and try to see what it is I may be able to help him with. "Can you clarify?",  I ask. He proceeds to tell me that he has tried everything, but his class just does not get it. "They don't understand the Roman empire or Juliues Cesear, even after watching a movie", he moaned. "I asked them to tell me one thing about the movie, one thing... and you know what they said Ben ?? You know what they said? They said it was about Rome." Success!!! You asked for one detail and they gave it to you, I thought.  He grumbled further, "Its like all they care about is their cell phones and the Internet."

Seeing that this was turning into a negative Nancy soliloquy I tried to think of some positive ways to engage the students with what I knew: they love cell phones and social media. So I told the teacher "Why don't you have them tweet about the movie while they are watching it?" His response ... "What is tweet?" At this point I find it fascinating that you can be a High School teacher and not know what Twitter is. However, being that this teacher is still learning to respond to emails I wasn't necessarily surprised. After explaining that they could formulate short thoughts about the movie, which may help with overall comprehension, he became enthusiastic. We started brainstorming other ideas to facilitate knowledge and understanding through social media.

It can often be tiresome for teachers to find ways to help our low ability/ low achieving students understand abstract or complicated academic material. The key to this is modifying instructional delivery to fit their interest and ability level. Although these strategies may not be specifically appropriate for children that do not have disabilities or learn at an average developmental rate, the possibilities are endless when one begins to look towards social media as a means of promoting comprehension and understanding of instruction.  Here are 6 easy ways to use social media to increasing comprehension.

1.) TWEET: Have students compose a tweet (they don't have to send it) after each paragraph they read or scene of a movie they watch. Encourage the student to use a minimum amount of characters to describe the main idea of what they just read. This will not only help them to take notes, it will also help them organize the information in the concise manner that they are used to when tweeting. Another option is to compose a Twitter handle of a person or concept (e.g. WWII), then compose tweets that would be consistent with that user. For example @JuliusCesear: Just finished conquering France #sotired

2.) #Hashtag: A Hashtag in its broadest sense is a way to order discussions on particular topics. For example: #WWII after any post on a social media site will group all of the comments on the topic of World War II together. Interestingly Generation Y has run with this concept and started using Hashtags as ways to express concepts. A teacher could have students compose 10 different Hashtags around a learning objective. For example the students are learning about Shakespear they could compose #playright, #Romeo&Juliet, #London, #GoldenAge, #QueenElizabeth, ect.

3.) Create a Facebook Profile and Timeline: This is a great way to organize and visually represent a concept or person that a student is learning about. Create a Facebook page for that concept or person. Lets say the student is learning about Winston Churchill. What important events would be on his timeline? Google pictures that you could add that would to reinforce the important aspects of his life or that time of history. What would his status updates read? This idea is similar to tweets in that the student what have to summarize important ideas about the topic in short sentences, reinforcing main ideas in a practical manner. One could even do a Facebook page for abstract ideas like Physics, or Photosynthesis.

4.) Compose a Rap or Viral Video on YouTube- Teenagers love You Tube and viral videos. Have student break into pairs and create a short rap or song about the chapter they a learning about. This can be done over a current song (which is has been done to death with that summer of 2012 song). They can film each other then decide which video is the best. Research even suggest music can help with memory     

5.)Create a playlist on Spotify- I love music and it often helps me focus and understand feelings in a deeper manner. Along with helping us remember things music can serve as a great mnemonic device. A student can name the playlist a certain topic e.g. American Revolution. Then each song in the list can serve as a different device to help them remember a key fact from the lesson. For example They could add Beastie Boys Paul Reverie to the list to help them remember Mr. Reverie's his role in the revolution. Helping the child relate the song to the lesson will increase their ability to retain what they have learned. They can then listen to the playlist while they study.

6.) Create a Meme- Ahh the Meme. If there was anything that so exemplified our teenagers today it is the Meme. Typically a Meme says so much with just so little and their are endless examples of how this can be achieved. By using a Meme generator students can use the main idea of a lesson and turn it into a Meme. For example a recent Meme was created for a US Gymnast that was not impressed with her dismal silver medal in the 2012 London Olympic games. Students could try to re-create this Meme with a current event or literary character in order to encourage understanding of a theme or concept. For example the "I'm not impressed Meme" could be used in the context of Scout in "To Kill a Mockingbird." Or maybe create a meme for Philosoraptor  to help explain Plato. The possibilities are endless.

So next time a frustrated teacher comes barging into your office complaining about how all the Special Education kids want to do is play on their phones, tell him "Great, I have just the trick for that."

*It should be noted that these ideas are heavily modified and may only be applicable for children who do not learn at the same rate or style as their peers.  However, I'm sure that you could get creative and use the same strategies for your AP European history class, the integration just may be more complicated. If your a frustrated Special Education teacher let me know how these work.

4 Steps to Prevent Unhelpful Narratives

As I sit in my office and review a file for a meeting I will have in the next half-hour, I am making every effort to use non-judgement to prevent pre-conceived notions about a parent. I have not met the parent. I have observed their child for a concise 20 minutes. However,  I have been exposed to a narrative that has come from everyone from the teacher all the way to the janitors... "Oh you are meeting with her?" "You better bring a Lawyer with you." "She is a piece of work." "I think she just want to make our lives hell."

Working in a school constantly exposes you to narratives and assumptions from personnel regarding parents, students and other teachers. Listening and processing these narratives feeds our left- brain.The left brain is responsible for logic and is in charge of verbalizing internal thoughts and feelings. The left hemisphere is also responsible for creating our life story, or autobiographical narrative. As such, when we process negative verbal information that we also begin to create our own narratives e.g. "Ugh I don't want to talk to that teacher", "That parent doesn't care about their child", "This student is just lazy".  You can't fault your left brain for stringing together this verbal information, as its doing its job. The left brain is really amazing and gives us novels, movies and the ability to put our feeling into words. However, the left brain's drive for giving verbal context to sensory information is so strong that it can often confabulate a story, taking cues from what it knows and putting them together in an answer that makes sense, even if it leaves out important information.  For this reason alone we must be able to stop serving it and call it a cab before it gets drunk on power. Not doing so can create opinions or judgments about things that may not take the whole picture into account.

Creating false narratives can be a disadvantage in a field that requires empirically based observations and data based decision making. The word empirical in its self implies that which is acquired through sensory experience, rather than left brain concocted theories. Therefore when making decisions, completing observations or going into a situation that already carries a narrative (most meetings), it is imperative to take these steps to stay in the moment and making informed observations about what is happening in the now.

1. Take a 3 Deep Breathes: Mindfulness and breathing are inseparable, and deep breathing is suggested ad nauseam  as a means to anchor yourself. Well it works and focusing on your breath will help you prepare to identify those pesky narratives with they jump into your head.
2. Take a quick body scan and notice how your body is feeling in the moment. Are you nervous? Is your heart beating faster than normal? Are your shoulders or jaw clenched. Noticing these somatic triggers will help you stay aware of the mind body connection. If your body is in a state of stress it will more likely grasp for any narrative it can in order to explain why you are feeling as such, even if this narrative has no basis in what is actually happening.
3. Notice the narrative when it arises: Here is where non-judgement comes into play. Notice judgments,  preconceived notions and assumptions when they pop-up. Acknowledge them as such and move your sensory awareness back to the task at hand, whether it be listening, writing or observing what is happening in the moment. 
4. Creative a new narrative: In the moment of acknowledging a toxic narrative it can be helpful to label it and creative a new narrative in a non-judgmental fashion. For example if a teacher says something along the lines of "I don't think this student's parent cares about school, he never returns his homework." Instead of using this information to create a theory of why homework is not returned, you can just repeat to yourself "listening", or "helping". These anchor words will help to create space between what is actually going on and what the toxic narrative is explaining is going on. I had a teacher same something similar to me once. We later found out that the student was doing all the homework; however he wasn't turning it in. Weeks of homework and assignments were crumbled up in balls at the bottom of his back pack. 

By having a consistent mindfulness practice we are better able to create the awareness necessary to not only notice maladaptive narratives when they arise, but also use our sensory experience to gain empirical information about what is actually happening in the moment. We can become better practitioners, consultants and team members if we stay in the moment and work with what is actually happening now, rather than continuing a story that our drunk Uncle Left Brain started weeks ago.

Morning links

• Test-based promotion policies can be successful (i.e. grade retention ) if  those retained are provided with research-based instruction in reading funding for said instruction. 

• Gratitude in children is linked to positive life outcomes such as a lower probability of abusing drugs and alcohol as well as behavior problems in school. Start those gratitude journals....

• Are we sure she wasn't just playing Words With Friends ??

• It appears confidence intervals are the new Emergency Pardon on death row. However, not sure if IQ testing correlates with moral/ethical aptitude...discuss....

• Human Genome project now appears to have a Neurological counterpart in the Human Cennectome Project... If anything it provides some beautiful visuals

• Educational Rap Videos appear to be a thing...

Mindfulness Goes Mainstream

Watch Mindfulness Going Mainstream on PBS. See more from Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly.

Well it looks like people are starting to catch on and mainstream media outlets(is PBS mainstream media?? ) are beginning to bring the benefits of Mindfulness in K-12 education to a larger audience. This is a great video that exemplifies the growing movement of not only the practice of Mindfulness, but also its application as a Social/ Emotional curriculum in schools.

As it has been painfully reported, America lags other industrialized nations in academics including below average results in Mathematics. Out of 65 industrialized nations we are 14th in Reading, 17th in Science and 25th in Math; however, where do we rank in self-regulation? Where do we rank in emotional control... where do we rank in self-awareness.... what about interpersonal awareness? We can hammer the 3 Rs into the heads of our future generations, but if they are unable to utilize these skills for personal growth and the interpersonal skills necessary to fulfill the basic social contract, then we have ultimately failed. Luckily, it looks like the 4th R, self-Regulation is starting to gain momentum as a viable learning foundation in K-12 education.

This segment from On Point with Tom Ashbrook does a great job of showing the importance of character development and Mindfulness, as well as the science behind it within educational settings. With Fox News reporting on Congressmen Tim Ryan's (D-Ohio) promotion of Mindfulness in his own life, we are starting to see an encouraging movement that is reaching across red states and blue states.