HOW TO get your students to CHILL – using focused attention exercises to bring calm into the classroom (includes example exercise)

It’s always the same, my students rush into the room, bouncing off the walls, spinning themselves into a frenzy of “teacher!! teacher!!” and end up slamming themselves into the (thankfully) padded floor. And I’m always glad of that – both the floor and the frenzy. They come in, full of energy, ready to tell me about their day, their feet or something equally random when we say our hellos. Little whirlwinds of energy, and I love it!

So how do we go from whirlwind to focused, calm and attentive?

One tried and tested exercise I use is something called ‘chocolate meditation’. Think (the master) John Kabat-Zinn’s raisin technique – with chocolate. This is especially great for kids and adults, but I’ve found the cost/quality of the chocolate needed with grown-ups is exceedingly higher than with kids 😉 But don’t stop at chocolate – use anything edible: candy, jelly, fruit etc…