Mitigating Detention with Meditation
In a world full of contrast, nothing lies at more polar ends than detention and meditation. On one hand, students are forced to sit in uncomfortable desks and stare at the wall, while the other implements the use of plush floor pillows and calming essential oils. Fortunately, for the students of Robert W. Coleman Elementary School, staff have implemented a “Mindful Moment Room,” where misbehaving youth are sent to evaluate their improper actions. Here, they are able to breathe in the relaxing scent of lavender, stretch to relieve tension, lounge on yoga mats, and utilize deep breathing in order to calm down. Despite the room only having been in effect for a few years, the school has already noticed a
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Their body’s alarm system is switched way on, so they may be primed for fight or flight and not able to sit calmly” (Bloom). For these kids, meditation becomes an outlet to relieve their pent-up emotions, and let their guards down for several moments. The room becomes a safe haven for them, which is why meditation should be more common in classrooms across the world, for students of all ages.
Another benefit of meditation is that it can increase students’ discipline, which in turn, decreases the school’s total number of suspensions. Deborah Bloom from CNN reports that “Thompson says she’s had zero suspensions since the room’s creation. The year before that, there were four suspensions” (Bloom). This is an impressive drop in numbers, convincing many to believe that meditation has a rightful spot at school. Its positive thinking and deep breathing methods allow for students to assume better control over their tempers, and suppress any desire to act out of order. Additionally, Mandy Oaklander from TIME further supports this claim by saying, “Three years after a Transcendental Meditation program was implemented at a troubled middle school, suspension rates dropped from 28% to 4% and teacher turnover plummeted” (Oaklander). These numbers show that meditation is truly more impactful than detention, and should be implemented
Effective mindfulness meditation requires training and practice and it has distinct measurable effects on our subjective experiences, our behavior, and our brain
This paper is about my experience with mindfulness based meditation and scientific inquiry of these experiences. Mindfulness based meditation is describes as technique used to cultivate nonreactive, non-judgmental and stable awareness of the present moment (Garland and Gaylord, 2009). The end goal is to sustain this meta-cognitive state for a long period of time. I practiced non-denominational form of mindfulness based meditation for the first time in my psychology class, which was devoted towards intellectual and experiential examination of meditation. The practice was conducted in a group it was instructed by our own professor and it begun at the end of class. There was one sessions per week and each session was structured meaning it was
Mindfulness should be taught in schools because it has been found to have a positive impact on the students ' mental well-being as mentioned above, as well as having positive impacts on a wide range of physical and mental health conditions, on learning and cognition, and on emotional and social skills and wellbeing among adults, according to Katherin (2012). Very little research has been done about mindfulness among the young people as compared to among the adults, with studies carried out so far having some methodological limitations such as limited use of control groups or randomization and small numbers, which result in tentative conclusions. Nevertheless, work is growing rapidly and the results are promising which suggests that mindfulness in schools is well worth doing.
The refugee crisis has been a contentious issue for the past decade as the amount of people seeking refuge in foreign countries is rising exponentially, with many countries turning to off shore detention as a way to deal with this issue (Coffey, Kaplan, Sampson & Tucci, 2010; Crock, Saul & Dastyari; Ljungholm, 2014). As a result of this influx the demand for human rights lawyers has increased, because the indefinite nature of the detention it is seen to be a breach of human rights (Saul, 2012; Evenhuis, 2013; Ljungholm, 2014). It is evident from the literature that long term indefinite detention of children and young adults has a significant adverse effect on their mental health, both long and short term. The two major themes that this literature
A major advantage for inmates is the meditation process. Four David Lynch Foundation TM instructors were invited to Rose M. Singer Center located at Riker’s Island to give an introductory talk about Transcendental Meditation (TM) to 20 female inmates who were incarcerated for a wide spectrum of offenses, from major to minor. The needs here are diverse. Offering TM could be a very valuable asset to help released individuals manage the stressful
External environments directly influence an individual’s stress level and their capacity to cope. Upon entering a public location, such as the DMV, I find myself annoyed, impatient, and stressed. By performing your meditation experience in public, you presented how efficiently controlling your own stress can affect your mindset. Rather than resting annoyed, you unearthed the beauty in a stressful situation. Through talking and postulating tips to the anxious girl, waiting to take her driver’s test, you possibly reduced her stress furthermore. This displays a growth in character and the start of mindful living.
In the article “Instead of detention, these students get meditation”, Deborah Bloom of CNN.com writes about the Mindful Moment Room and its effects on students that attend Robert W. Coleman Elementary School. The Mindful Moment Room is the school’s meditation room where teachers send disruptive students instead of detention. The Mindful Moment Room is a “warm, brightly lit space strewn with purple floor pillows, yoga mats and the scents of essential oils.” In the room, kids are given the opportunity to stretch, do yoga and practice deep breathing that help them simmer down before returning to class. Most of the students that are disruptive and rowdy in class are the ones that are facing high-stress situations at home which cause strife at school.
Students at Rockhurst High School know this prayer far too well. The “Glory Be” signals the end of another school day. From 8:00 am to 3:00 pm, 1,000 teenage boys are cooped up inside the walls of Rockhurst. Yet, as Mr. Darby’s voice fades from the intercom each afternoon, they reach freedom. Students rush out of the many different exits around the building, running to their cars in hopes of beating the afternoon parking lot traffic. They are ready to unwind, just relax a little bit. However, many students at Rockhurst experience the opposite of that. Home is not a place for relaxation and downtime;
According to the article, meditation can ease depression, anxiety and other psychological stressors, all issues that can negatively impact a child’s academic performance. With that said, since a majority of the students at Robert W. Coleman come from high-stress environments, meditation has done wonders. Therefore, the Mindful Meditation Room creates an environment where students are able of decompressing while also enhancing their ability to learn.
Meditation reminds me every day of what a sane, mindful mind feels like. By having that as a daily reference, I can more clearly see how “insane” a lot of my former activities were. I noticed this right after my first meditation session. Numerous times, I found myself opening up Facebook, and then cringing at the notion of flooding my mind with random information highs and funny pictures. After abandoning both Facebook and reddit, I was about to check out news sites, including the Drudge Report and the Huffington Post, and again, I cringed. The thought of those large, bold headlines hitting me with inflammatory content seemed insane. I’ve now come to believe that meditation is one of the best responses to modern information
come to the conclusion that there is a limit to what they can do. A conscious
Meditation means to concentrate and connect with ones’ own mind, to explore identity and emotions in order to be aware of conscious, sub-conscious and unconscious thoughts. Meditation originates and has been has been practiced in Asia for thousands of years for different reasons such as increasing concentration abilities, religious purposes and also to train the mind. This essay will focus on how meditation affects brain plasticity (ability to change), emotionally and intellectually, leading to better performance and coping abilities in stressful situations. Things like attention span, memory functions and complexity of emotions will be further explored and may interest the reader since meditation can answer many questions on improving mental health that affects almost everyone. I will make the claim that meditation practice needs to be introduced early into educational institutions such as schools. Because evidence suggests that that meditation increases the volume of the cortex in the brain, leading to a higher and more powerful emotional intellect and cognition that improves things like memory, attention and emotional control. It is logical to assume that in order to alter thickness of cortex, mental thought functions and emotional strength, meditation should be introduced to children early in school for greater performance.
Children and adolescents in the United States face different psychological challenges, such as anxiety disorders, depression, attention deficit disorder, as well as many other psychiatric diagnoses (Bloom, Dey, & Freeman, 2006). The prevalence rate of children diagnosed with a mental disorder is alarming. According to Merikangas et al. (2010), 22.2% of American children and adolescents get diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder that is severe enough to impair their ability to attend school and learn (Bucci, Marques, Oh, & Harris, 2016). Kids that are plagued by various psychological illnesses may experience a difficult time concentrating and staying focused in school. Additionally, the over-accumulation of toxic stress, either due to the pressures of schools or environmental (i.e., difficult exams, poverty, household dysfunction, etc.), can have negative and detrimental effects during childhood, as well as adulthood (Bucci et al., 2016).
Many people think that mindfulness meditation consists solely of sitting still and thinking about nothing for twenty or thirty minutes and are put off by the thought. In fact, mindfulness
Meditation can destroy the stress accumulated during the day and bring you inner peace. Now we'll show you how easy it is to learn to meditate when you need it most.