In an OMG world, one school takes time out for 'om'

On Board Online • September 26, 2016

By Gayle Simidian
Research Analyst

A voice crackles over the loudspeaker at North Albany Academy at 10:30 a.m. and 2:10 p.m. to make an announcement: It's time for a "Mindful Moment." The calm voice instructs everyone in the school to close his or her eyes for a moment of reflection. For a few minutes, chatter in the classrooms and hallways ceases as students and adults become silent.

This happens twice a day in the PK-8 school in the Albany City School District.

The goal is to help students manage their emotions and reduce discipline referrals, according to Lesley Buff, the school's principal. The program began in March.

Meditation is used in schools to relieve stress and help students improve focus. Studies point to the effectiveness of meditative practices, which can take many forms. They include breathing exercises, visualizations, positive affirmations, or even "a mindful minute paying attention to the taste of a raisin," according to a November 2015 article in The Atlantic.

A 2014 article in the journal Frontiers of Psychology examined the effects of 24 studies of the psychological impact of a meditative practice called "mindfulness." Mindfulness involves focusing on the present moment and was popularized in the 1994 bestseller Wherever You Go, There You Are by Jon Kabat-Zinn. Findings show that mindfulness practice improved attention spans. Mindfulness also helped to a smaller degree with stress reduction and "resilience," defined by the study as positive well-being and self-concept.

Often, mindfulness involves focusing on one's breathing as a technique to quiet the mind and minimize distracting or anxious thoughts. A similar technique involves repeating a mantra (such as "om").

The San Francisco Unified School District has a Quiet Time program that consists of two 15-minute meditative breaks during the school day for middle and high school students. Seventeen studies, varying in duration from three months to one year, show benefits including reduced suspensions, increased attendance and increased academic performance, according to The New York Times. "A controlled study by WestEd found ninth-graders who meditated showed a significant decrease in anxiety and a significant increase in resilience compared to non-meditating students. Meditating students also reported sleeping better as well as higher levels of self-confidence and happiness," the Times reported.

A brochure for the program notes that Quiet Time is a secular program that uses a technique called transcendental meditation. Although meditation can be a religious practice, secular settings such as schools and offices have found ways to encourage meditative breaks as "a common-sense lifestyle habit, like getting enough exercise or eating green vegetables" according to The Atlantic article.

In North Albany Academy, the Mindful Moments program began when school leaders met with a staff member from the Albany Peace Project, a decade-long research project designed to test the effectiveness of mediation on crime rates.

Each teacher and school administrator was trained and has chimes to signal the start and end times of classroom meditative practice. School staff introduced the exercise to students by explaining "successful adults know how to manage their emotions" said Buff.

Even though the program is in its initial stages, Buff told On Board in an email that teachers report that their students "are more focused and calmer." And, according to what Buff hears from teachers, the practice has the additional benefit of helping teachers "refocus," which is noteworthy since, according to Buff, "Stressed out teachers = more referrals," she said in the email.

Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story misplaced a quotation mark in the citation of The New York Times

To view the Frontiers in Psychology study about mindfulness interventions, go to http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00603/full .

To learn more about meditation in schools, go to http://mcc.gse.harvard.edu/files/gse-mcc/files/mindfulness.pdf .