Author Archives: TheMindfulnessTeacher

I am Holly Morris, an independent children's Mental Health & Emotional Well-Being practitioner. I am the director of 'The Mindfulness Teacher' Limited and under this umbrella, I work in primary schools in the UK, delivering evidence-based and bespoke interventions to students & coaching and consulting members of leadership in student well-being. I developed 'Cahhlm Classes' as a free and simple way for teachers to deliver mindfulness and well-being practices in the classroom. This started out as a YouTube channel and is soon to be a subscription-based program for schools worldwide.

The ‘Body First’ Approach for Improving Learning & Concentration

This is a transcript of my podcast episode number 2. If you would prefer to listen to it, it is available on Anchor, Spotify, Apple Podcasts and YouTube.

Yesterday I was at a wellness retreat for the day, and the instructor that was leading it started with their introductions. You know when you talk a bit about health and safety, where the toilets are, basics like that? And they said that they use a body first approach, and I’d never heard of this before.

A body first approach is where you honour your needs. They’re the priority and they come first.

Honour your needs.

So it’s just simple things like if you need the toilet, you go to the toilet. She said, “don’t wait for me to finish talking. Don’t wait until it seems to be a convenient time to go to the toilet. If you need the toilet, you’ve got to honour your body and honour your needs and go to the toilet when you need it. Same with if you need a sip of water, don’t wait until it’s the break time. Have a sip of water whenever you want. Same with snacks.” And this made a big difference to me because I do have hypoglycaemia, so I get low blood sugars and it just meant that every now and then I got my snack out of my bag (it was just some nuts and raisins) and I was just munching on them. And usually I feel awkward, I feel rude, but I actually needed it because I was getting brain fog and I was losing my concentration. So I know I needed just a little pick me up then and I could have my snack knowing this.

Knowing that the instructor was happy for me to do that, and also that she had addressed that with the group, so there was no one going to be thinking of me: “That’s rude. Why is she eating now?” It was addressed at the start of the session, so it made it easier for me to focus and concentrate by having my snack when I simply felt hungry, and by the instructor making it clear that it was all right, I didn’t have any worry or anxiety around it anymore.

So imagine if this was happening in schools and the teachers are saying this to their students, then it would just eliminate any anxieties for them around, asking for what they need. It improves their focus and their concentration and therefore improve their learning and retention rate.

Another amazing thing they said was just sit comfortably. So she said, “Sometimes we might stand to do some workshops, some of them will sit down, some will be lying down” (because we had some yoga) But she said, “Whatever you need, honor your needs.” And there were some points where, again, we were stood up and she was chatting away at the end of an activity and I just needed to sit down. I just thought, “oh, getting a bit tired”, the same for my friend who’s pregnant. It sounds so simple, just sitting down when you weren’t invited to sit down, but not feeling awkward about it, not feeling rude. And it was just such a welcoming atmosphere.

And only by her saying a few words at the start of the day, it changed the whole ethos of the day, the whole vibe of it. You just felt, how do I explain it? You felt respected and I think we need to do this, we need to do this in schools.

On reflection, I just feel awful for all the years I’ve been teaching, because I’ve always insisted that my students all sit on the carpet, they all cross their legs, they all face me, and yes, it looks great. It’s easy for me to ensure that they’re all being well behaved and they’re all listening, (I presume), but actually, are they listening? I don’t really know that. If I was questioning them, obviously I do ask them some formative questions, but it’s hard to target them all, all of the time to ensure that they’re all listening. But, yeah, it’s only through having the experience of being a student for the day at this wellbeing workshop that I found that it was actually really difficult.

And no, I’m not hyperactive. In fact, I’m never really active at all. I’m pretty good at concentrating for sustained periods of time. I’m neurotypical, so I can’t quite imagine how cognitively demanding this must be for some of our learners that have these challenges anyway and naturally find this difficult.

I even had the luxury of sitting on a yoga mat, and I still couldn’t get comfortable. Every five minutes I was squirming around. And I know when children like that on the carpet in my lessons, I remind them, sit still, face the front. “Come on, cross your legs.” And it’s just not comfortable is it?

We keep asking that of our young children, children who are always really active. And it just makes me think, who are we doing this for? Is it for our benefit as the teachers? So, yeah, it’s easy for us to make sure everyone’s doing the right thing.

Or is it for compliance? Is it that notion of embedding that children should do as the adult asks them?

Is it just because we’ve been told to do that and that’s been modeled to us and our teacher training and we just follow along with it?

Or is it to ensure that we get the best learning outcomes for the students? Is it to make sure that they’re in the optimal state for listening and learning and for focusing? Is it because we put the children’s needs first and we make sure that they’re all comfortable, they all feel safe, and they all feel important and listen to?

If I was that cross legged facing the front the whole time, I’d be uncomfortable. I wouldn’t be listening properly, I’d be thinking about other things, I’d be thinking about how uncomfortable I was, how hungry I was, that I needed the toilet. And then I’d be thinking in my head, is it a good time to go to the toilet now? Has she finished speaking? Has she finished that sentence? Is she talking about the new topic? And do I have to put my hand up to go to the toilet to ask or do I just walk out now? What will people think of me when they wonder where am I going? Should I announce I’m just popping into the toilet? And you spent the time thinking about all those questions instead of just being in the present moment and learning from the instructor, like in school, instead of listening to the teacher.

So if you’re in, say, an English lesson, the children would just switch off and be thinking those things constantly. So we just need to make this change in schools! Please, if you are a teacher, please try this out! John Swaller, who developed the cognitive load theory, says that young people can only hold between three and five pieces of information in their minds at once. That’s it – three, four or five pieces of information. Obviously, all children are different and there is a bit of leeway in that. That’s an average.

So if one of those pieces of information was the knowledge that they’re hungry, another was them thinking, “how long is it until break time when I can eat?” And the third is, “I wonder what fruit is in the snack bowl today?” And then add the hunger pangs and the frustration into the mix and there’s not much cognitive space left for learning, is there?

So if, as teachers, we told our students to put their basic needs first, such as the hunger, their thirst excretion needs, their comfort, we could free up that cognitive load for learning. And we could also eliminate all of those anxiety inducing questions that they might be mulling over and over in their heads like I was.

So let’s think about how we could practically apply these body first principles into a classroom setting.

So let’s think first about the example of going to the toilet whenever they want.

I use a signal in class, a hand signal that children can so that children can let me know when they need to go to the toilet. And they just make a T letter with their hand. So sometimes I’d use that. So they put one hand up in front of the heart vertically, and then with the other hand, they do it horizontally across the top, so it’s like a capital T in front of their chest. And then when I’m doing the instruction part, it just makes it super clear. If a child is making that T signal, I know that they need to go to the toilet. They’re not putting their hand up. So I’m not thinking,” oh, they want to ask me a random question, or they want to tell me something.”

So if I’m asking a question, say, in Maths: “tell me a number bond to 20”, and if you’ve got a hand up, I’m not thinking that they’re going to answer me, because what I often see is teachers, they’ll say, “yes, Sally, what’s your answer? You’ve got your hand up”. And when Sally says, “Can I go to the toilet?” The teachers moan, “Uhhhhh, yes, okay”. It’s an annoyance. And that’s going to cause children to feel like a burden. They’re trying to honor their needs. They need the toilet. It’s a simple human right to go to the toilet when we need to. And then this child, Sally, she’s been made to feel like she’s a burden, she’s an annoyance, and the teachers feeling frustrated with her. But that’s the rule in the class, isn’t it? Put your hand up to ask to go to the toilet. So she’s doing the right thing, but she’s not then being respected for doing that.

So if she’s making a hand signal, what I could see is, if I’m asking a question, what’s the number bond to 20? I can see that Sally has NOT got her hand up. She’s making a ‘T’ with her hands, so I know she needs the toilet. So instead of even interrupting my flow, I can make eye contact with Sally, give her a little nod or a thumbs up, then she knows she can get up and go to the toilet in silence. Nothing needs to be said between you both. And then I can go to the next person and say, “Oh, yeah, Fred, you’ve got your hand up here. What’s the answer?” The flow continues. Your lesson is not interrupted.

I do have a post on my website, actually, where I’ve made hand signals from the classroom. So there’s one for needing the toilet, there’s one for needing a tissue, one for needing a drink of water. https://cahhlmclasses.com/resources/ols/products/silent-signals-a3-digital-poster

Because we do still have those rules in most schools, don’t we, where you need to ask to do things, because if all children, all 30 children were getting up and doing whatever they wanted, it would just be chaotic. So we do still need that. Our barrier needs to be to still have to still ask for permission, but it’s without us making them feel like a burden for honoring their needs. Going to the toilet whenever we need to is one of the physiological needs in Maslow’s Hierarchy. I’m sure you’ve come across this model, but if not, it’s called Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, and it’s a model for understanding the motivations for human behaviour. And it’s a triangle shape or a pyramid, and it’s layered. At the top is self-actualization, and underneath all the layers, are the steps that you need to meet in order to reach self actualisation.

The first layer of the physiological needs are the absolute basics that we need. And in that is excretion, which we’ve covered, also in there is water and food. So let’s think about that.

So to have a drink of water in class, I think it’s pretty similar in most classes that the water bottles are kept in one particular place just to avoid spillages and work and textbooks getting wet, which I think is a fair point. And I think in most schools, we do have the rule where you ask if you need a sip of water, but you can go and get a drink whenever, really, as long as you ask in class. I say to my students that as long as I’m not teaching, (it’s not the instruction part of the lesson), then they can get up and get a drink of water whenever they need to. They don’t have to ask me. They can just get up, go to the place where we keep the water bottles. We always keep near the sink because the floor is there. There isn’t carpet, there’s just waterproof flooring. They can have a drink whenever they want, (and I say waterproof flooring – I do teach five year olds!).

But when it comes to food, what we tend to see is that children are only allowed to eat at set times. It tends to be break time in the morning where they can have a snack and then lunchtime when they serve their lunch. We also know that some children may not have breakfast in the morning.

Imagine a day when you wake up late, you’re in a rush to get ready. You don’t have time to have breakfast, and you go to a meeting or you get to school and you’ve got a fully packed morning. Your energy and concentration levels won’t be at their peak. On the days that you haven’t had breakfast, your concentration span will probably have weakened. You’ll probably be counting down the minutes until it’s break time when you can get some food. As in most schools, it’s – I wouldn’t say it’s a rule – but it’s kind of like unspoken agreement that you don’t as a teacher, you don’t sit and eat at the front of the class. You wouldn’t really eat in front of your students, especially because you have the rule that they can’t eat whenever they want to.

Now why do we really have that? I understand if we’re sat there eating unhealthy food or food that isn’t accessible to the students. It seemed as a bit unfair, isn’t it? If we’re sat there with a bag of maltesers where they can’t have anything and then a snack time, they’re only allowed apples, but what if we switched the rules up where there was a bowl of fruit, a communal bowl of fruit that was available at any time during the morning? So as a teacher OR as a student, if you hadn’t had breakfast that morning, (or even if you had it and were just extra hungry), you could just eat a piece of fruit. You probably go to an area to have your piece of fruit. So instead of counting down the minutes until it’s break time, when you can have some fruit and satiate that need, that hunger, you simply meet your need when suits you. And then this will increase your energy levels, your concentration levels, and then you’re able to then fully concentrate on your learning. And then that barrier to learning isn’t there anymore. The need has been met and that barrier has been broken down.

I suggest having the same rule for this as the drinking rule. So that as long as it’s not the instruction part of the lesson where you’re teaching and all the students are listening to you, then your pupils can get up, they can go and get their fruit whenever they need for the first week or so. I’m sure you’ll get all children wanting to have their fruit the second that they come in the door! But within a few days, that novelty factor will wear off and children will learn to identify their own hunger needs. They’ll be checking in with their body. It’s almost doing a body scan. They’ll be checking in with their hunger levels and when they notice that they are hungry, they can meet their needs then it’s giving their ownership back to them. The ownership of their needs, ownership over their body. And them being independent and recognizing when they’re hungry instead of us telling them when they should eat. It’s been recognizing this for themselves, which is life skill, isn’t it? I would also keep the rule that they can only have one piece of fruit each. So it’s not as if they get into school and they’re having a piece of fruit at 09:00 A.m. And then also having one at 10:00 A.m., and then by the time it’s break time, there’s no fruit left for anybody else. It’s that they know they have one piece of fruit. They can have that whatever time in the morning that they choose.

And the next part is allowing children to sit or stand however they want. This will help aid their concentration. Again, like the eating. So the first few days when you introduce it to the children, it is going to have a massive novelty factor and they will be a bit silly with it and they’ll be trying it on and testing your boundaries with it. But when we persist with it and that novelty factor wears off, the benefits that come from this can be enormous. The concentration will go right up.

How are you listening to this podcast? Are you sat upright? Is your back straight? Are you facing your phone like we face the front in class? And I know we do that for a sign of respect. (We’ll get on to that in a minute). You’re probably not thinking about how you might listen to a podcast best. Most people listen best when they’re doing other things – when they’re washing the pots, when they are driving to work, when they’re doing jobs around the house. It doesn’t mean that you don’t take that information in and you don’t learn from the podcasts. So maybe we should give the children the option.

So when you’re doing the instruction part of the lesson or the input, if you usually get all your class to sit on the carpet to listen to you, you could say to them, today you can choose whether you sit at the carpet or you stay sat at your desk. When they’re on the carpet, they can choose if they cross their legs or if they put their legs out straight, or even if they lie down, if they want to look at you and make eye contact, or if they want to close their eyes. Most children listen to storybooks at night time with their eyes closed and in the dark. It doesn’t mean that they’re not listening to the stories. In fact, these are probably the times that most children cherish as teenagers and adults. When we look back on our lives and we say those times when we had our stories read to us as children were in bed, they were the most magical times ever. Because of shutting off the other senses, the visual sense, which can be really distracting. It’s such an overwhelming sense. All the lights, the shades, the textures that we could be taken into our eyes. But if we shut that sense off, then it’s only going to heighten the auditory senses. It’s only going to make us concentrate more on what we can hear rather than what we can see. So therefore children will be concentrating. They’ll be paying full attention to what you’re saying.

I would give them the rule that their body language needs to be facing in your direction because if their chair was facing the opposite end of the classroom, because of how sound travels, they’re not going to hear you as clearly compared to if they were facing you. This doesn’t mean that they have to have their eyes open or their head even directly in line with yours. They could be looking down towards their table or gazing softly into space.

It is important though, to iterate that children need to be paying attention. And to check this, you could just ask them questions every now and then. Ask them simple recall questions. If they can just repeat the sentence that you last said. If they can give you the gist of what the sentence was, then yes, they’re listening and they’re paying attention. If not, then you will have to set those boundaries again and remind them of those boundaries. So they can choose to sit however they want and whatever is most comfortable for them. But they need to be paying attention to you and listening. And if they can’t do so, you might have to tighten those boundaries a bit so you might change the rules so that they’re not lying down. They can choose if they’re sitting on the carpet or at the desk.

The one point that raised in my mind about the children choosing to close their eyes or not or to not look directly at the speaker when they’re talking to them, is respect. Now, we’re taught to look into the eye of who’s talking to us as a sign of respect. And I think as long as your students can do that at a conversational level and when you just chat into them in class, if they can make eye contact with you then that’s fine to let them in lesson time close their eyes or not look at you because you know that they can do that skill. It’s maybe when the children are younger, it’s just making sure that it is also a priority that when you’re having conversations with them at play time, at dinner time, and in the lesson when they’re doing their independent work or group tasks with you, that they can make that eye contact. Making eye contact does help with making a bond with building a relationship with somebody. It helps you read facial expressions. You can tell by the way that their eyes move, for example, if they’re squinting, it will help you understand if they’re smiling or frowning and it can improve the understanding between each of you.

So to summarize our episode, we’ve talked about how we can introduce the ‘Body First’ approach into our classrooms by putting our students needs first – so their needs, such as thirst, hunger, excretion & comfort. And we can give our students the authority to put their own needs first by altering our classroom rules and introducing hand signals so that the children can communicate their needs to us.

Because these basic physiological needs, according to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, are our absolute basic human needs. And until those basic needs are met, they act as huge blockages that prevent our students from learning. So, (like we spoke about in episode one, ‘The Only Things That Cause Challenging Behaviour in Children’), when students have an unmet need – so if they’re hungry or if they need the toilet – the body is constantly sending them signals to say, “Help me! Help, I need something!” And until that needs met, the body is going to keep sending those signals. And these signals are distractions to the children (and to adults as well). These signals and distractions won’t stop until that needs met.

I’m thinking of the cognitive load theory that John Sweller developed. And when our brain’s cognitively overloaded, the learning process either slows right down or completely shuts. It completely stops because the brain can no longer process all the information. And that means that the children aren’t learning, and they’re not going to remember what you’re saying. So we need to meet those needs in order for them to learn.

The body first approach isn’t just for the neurodiverse learners, but also for the physically diverse. It’s for all our learners. We’re also unique in so many ways, and we all have needs. This is a way to make sure that our children come first. And as our educators, we adapt the learning environment to be as suitable for learning as we possibly can. We spend years teaching the children to sit still, and is this for our benefit or for theirs? No wonder it takes them years to learn. It’s against our very nature. As human beings, our bodies are designed to be active, to support our circulation. So when we spend years insisting that they sit still, and then when they’re teenagers and they’ve eventually mastered it, society’s then telling them to not be sedentary and to move more. So maybe we should think about changing our classroom expectations so that they suit the children instead of suiting us adults? We should put the children first and meet their needs instead of fighting against that grain and causing us all frustration and annoyance. When children can’t sit still and they can’t listen perfectly, we meet them where they’re at and we do what’s best for them.

Thank you for spending time with me today, and I’d love to hear if you implement these ideas in your classroom. Let me know how you get on.

Speak soon!

Holly Morris

_{Cognitive Load Theory – https://researchschool.org.uk/durrington/news/cognitive-load-theory-and-what-it-means-for-classroom-teachers}

Our Website – Cahhlm Classes

Our YouTube Channel – Cahhlm Kids

The only 2 things that cause challenging behaviour in children

If you would prefer to listen to this as a podcast, here is it on Spotify:

Let’s start with what behaviour is. Let’s cover the absolute basics so you can understand what’s going on inside your children or students.

Behaviour is communication.

It’s a way that we talk to others. Not verbally talk, but symbolically. It is a way that we express what we want or need.

Inside our bodies we receive a signal from to indicate we want or need something. These signals can come in 3 forms – a sensation, an emotion or a thought.

E.G., sensation (such as pain or aches, tightness or tingling) – is our body telling us that something is not well in that area. It may need rubbing, stretching, care of some sort).

Lots of people use the words ‘feeling’ and ‘emotion’ interchangeably when a feeling is a physical sensation. What makes it more confusing is that emotions can also create sensations in our body – such as warm, flushed cheeks when we are embarrassed or angry.

Emotions (feeling happy, sad, angry, scared, surprised, disgusted) are our bodies telling us to pay attention what is going on in our lives right now. Something is happening that you need to learn from.

If you’re feeling angry, whatever is happening right now, isn’t fair, and you need to identify what it is to sort it out.

Back when we were cavemen and women, it may be that someone has taken the berries you collected that morning on your scavenge and if you don’t get them back it can impact your family’s chance of survival. All emotions are primal bodily responses and the 6 core emotions that I just listed (happiess, sadness, anger, fear, surprise & disgust) are to prime us to the highest chance of survival.

Nowadays, it’s more likely to be that someone’s jumped infront of you in the queue or been rude to you.

If you’re feeling happy, it’s your body telling you to notice what you’re doing now and to do more of it because it makes you feel good and safe, meaning you’re more likely to survive.

Emotions are always telling us to do more of what keeps us safe and comfortable and less of what makes us feel uncomfortable, meaning it could be putting us in harm/danger.

This innate drive for experiences that make us feel good are what can lead us to addictions. But too much of a good thing can have a negative effect on the body.

The final signal our body could give us is a thought – an idea or an opinion from the mind.

To summarise, We receive a signal – in the form of a sensation, an emotion or a thought – to inform us what we want or need.

These needs and wants drive our behaviours. They cause us to act. They are our motivators to get what we want all day, everyday.

Sensation – dry mouth. Need = a drink of water. Motivates our Behaviour – get up, go to the kitchen, get a glass, fill it up and drink.

Emotion – boredom. Want – to read a book. Motivates our Behaviour – to get up, find the book, read it.

Thought – “I wonder how much a new phone would cost”. Want – to find out. Motivates our Behaviour – look online to find out.

These behaviours show others what our underlying wants or needs are without having to say anything. By seeing me drink a glass of water, we can translate this behavior into ‘She must have been thirsty’ and by reading a book you can infer ‘she must have been bored, had some spare time and she likes romantic fiction.’ By seeing me on my phone … well you probably couldn’t see the screen so you’d probably just think I was rude but you get the gist…

Just like you can tell somebody’s mood from their facial expressions. You can tell their wants & needs from their actions. From their behavior.

And we all have those signals – sensations/emotions/thoughts – no matter what age. Even babies. We all have wants and needs as well. These are instinctual, just as a baby has a want for warmth and comfort and will cry if their caregiver puts them down, they just want to be held and to feel safe.

The ONLY 2 things that will be causing your child’s or student’s challenging behaviour are their UNMET WANTS and UNMET NEEDS!

So now you have a basic knowledge of behavior, let’s apply that to our children or students…

As adults, when we have a want/need we can usually meet it ourselves. The sometimes irrational behaviours that we see in children often show themselves when they have a want or a need but they can’t physically meet themselves and this leads to frustration. UNMET WANTS AND UNMET NEEDS. If you meet them, the behavior will stop. Straight away. Instantly. There won’t be a need for it anymore.

If you meet their needs, the behaviour will stop. Straight away. Instantly. There won’t be a need for it anymore.

So the child can’t physically meet this want/need by themselves so the easy answer would be to ask someone who can to meet if for them. Simple. But the issue is that:

Or they CAN’T verbalise what they want. They can’t put it into words and say it. This may be because of a speech and communication difficulty, because of their young age and they’ve not yet mastered these skills or because they simply can’t translate that feeling into words which is quite a high-order skill that many adults haven’t quite perfected yet!
They don’t actually know what they want/need. (a toddler may feel a pang of jealousy watching their mum hug another child but they don’t know that they want attention and love and hugs. They are only aware of the physical feelings of jealousy inside, the sinking feeling in their stomach, the tears welling inside their eyes, the longing ache in their heart)
Or they DON’T WANT TO verbalise what they want. (their experience of expressing their needs gets them shut down “don’t cry, only babies cry” “stop asking or you won’t get anything”)

Let’s talk through some examples for how your children or students may behave, and how it always ALWAYS stems back to them having an unmet want or need.

Let’s start with a toddler

Signal of Sensation – hunger in their stomach

Need – food

But because they can’t physically go and get the food from the kitchen, this is where issues arise. If they can talk they can say ‘mum/dad, I’m hungry.’ Problem solved. Need met.

But if they can’t, like with most toddlers, this need will drive their behaviour to maybe crawl to the kitchen and to reach up at the cupboards, to shout or winge or to chew other objects.

We can see someone’s behavior and are usually able to tell what they want or need.

If the caregiver can, in this case, work out that our toddler is hungry, then we can get them the food they need, their need is met, their hunger is satiated and their behavior will stop.

The issues come when the caregiver can’t read the behavior. Remember, BEHAVIOUR IS COMMUNICATION. The caregiver needs to act like a translator, translating the behaviour into language.

If they can’t translate the child would get frustrated and annoyed, after some time the hunger pangs would get stronger, the need would become stronger, the resulting behavior will become stronger.

Instead of winging, they may be screaming, crying, kicking. This is why we have phrases such as ‘toddler tantrums and the terrible twos’ because they’re at the very start of their journey in learning to talk so this frustration of not being understood happens regularly and leads to them feeling frustrated.

Then this can lead to the adult becoming frustrated that they can’t understand why they are acting like that, they would be triggered and annoyed and their mood/behaviour will be affected.

Now this is a pivotal moment for the adult. It can go one way or the other.

Route A – they can take a deep breath to stay calm and logical. They can share their calm with their child and help calm them down by soothing them with a hug, or crouch down onto their level and reassure them that everything’s alright in a calm tone of voice. They can clearly ask them to point to what they want or ask yes/no questions to decipher what they want. For example, do you need the toilet? Do you want some food? Do you want to go outside? Until you find out what it is.

Route B – If they don’t act as the investigator to find out what it is, maybe because they’re in a rush, they don’t have the time for that or the patience that day, then the child’s need still isn’t met. In this case, they’re still hungry. This sensation is only going to get stronger. Their behavior is only going to get bigger, bolder and stronger to express their stronger need.

This is going to continue until that need is met. Until they’ve eaten. Remember, it’s a survival instinct. To survive we must eat.

When you don’t have the time or patience, it’s common for us to say “stop. stop whining, stop whinging, stop crying”. The child can then either stop, but it will only be a short while until their hunger gets worse, or they don’t stop expressing their need, you get angry at them for not following their instructions so your mood gets worse, they start shouting or try to discipline them for not doing as they said. Think – “if you don’t stop, they’re won’t be any sweets tonight/going to your friends house/presents from santa”. Then it’s a never ending battle of the wills until someone gives in and it’s dinner time and the needs get met coincidentally.

This can also happen with older children who can verbalise their needs, but they may not know that a growl in their stomach means hunger or it may be a subtle hunger or a drop in their blood sugars which is harder to identify. This is my son whose 3 years old and he gets pure hangry at 4 o’clock. This is when, as the caregiver, you get to know your child and can predict when they will get hungry and provide them with a snack before the behavior starts.

Let’s look at another example for a child who can communicate but may not be able to identify what their want or need is.

Picture this – you’re going out so you hold up your child’s coat and tell them to put it on as you usher their arms into it.

Signal from their body as Emotion – anger (telling us something is not fair)

Want – to not have his coat on.

Behaviour – they shout no and throw their coat onto the floor.

OK, so we get the gist that they don’t want their coat on and if it’s optional for them to wear it, we would just have a reminder for how we say no politely (and actually we could have asked if they want to wear their coat instead of telling them to wear it) and they don’t wear it so their want is met and the unwanted behaviours stop.

But if it’s not an option wether to wear the coat or not, this is where we need to be investigators. Why don’t they want to wear it? Because when we know that core want, we can meet it and solve the problem.

So the simplest way to do this is to:

Stay calm. Share that calm with them. Soothe them if they need it by using a relaxed tone of voice, relaxed posture, maybe come down to their eye level. They may need a hug.
Simply communicate. Ask them why they don’t want to wear it. If they’re not sure, give them options. Is it because you’re already warm? Do you not like this coat? Is it because you want your batman t-shirt on show? So they can answer yes or no.

Remember that anger is when something doesn’t feel fair to them.
So if you know the reason for the anger, you can logically explain it to seem fair and reduce that emotion and the unwanted behaviours.

So if they’re already warm you can explain it is sunny outside but there is a cold wind so you will feel cold when we go outside.

If they don’t like the coat? They can choose another coat to wear.

If they want their batman t-shirt on show? They can take their coat off when you get to your destination.

Then they feel that it’s fair and you will get the behaviors that you want.

This happened with my son and it turns out that the zip on that coat scratched underneath his chin when he wore it. I didn’t find this out until later that day when he was calm which is why step 1 is so important. When children feel string emotions, this cuts off the logical side of their brain so they can’t tell you why.

If you don’t become the investigator and you urge them to put it on, it ends up in a battle. They become angrier, you become annoyed, their emotions get stronger so their behaviours become bigger and before you know it, you’re telling them that Christmas is cancelled, all because they didn’t want their coat on.

When were in a rush to leave the house, it may seem too time consuming to stop and ask them 21 questions for what can seem like the smallest point in the world to you, but the alternative is that your child learns that ‘their opinion doesn’t matter. You don’t care what they think’ if you don’t listen to them. When this subliminal message is repeated day in and day out, on small matters as to wether they want their coat on or not, they soon stop telling you their wants and needs. And you don’t want that when they’re teenagers and they need someone to turn to when their issues are a lot more significant than wearing their coat or not.

So, to summarise, in this podcast we’ve learnt:

That behavior is a form of communication.
To put a stop to their challenging behaviour/meltdowns, you need to meet their want or need.
When a child displays challenging behavior, you should put you’re your Sherlock Holme’s flat cap on and ask yourself ‘What do they want or need?’
Then you will be able to meet them, stop the need for challenging behaviours and your child or student will feel seen, heard & understood.

Affirmations in the Classroom

What are affirmations?

Affirmations are positive statements that we can read or say out loud that help us to become the best version of ourselves.

E.G., I am brave. I believe in myself.

Do they work?

Yes, there is a fair amount of neuroscientific research into positive affirmations and the ‘self-affirmation theory’, created by Steele in 1988.

There is MRI evidence suggesting that certain neural pathways are increased when people practice self-affirmation tasks (Cascio et al., 2016). The part of the brain that involved in self-related information processing – the ventromedial prefrontal cortex— becomes more active when we consider our personal values (Falk et al., 2015; Cascio et al., 2016).

How could we use them in the classroom?

We could recite some with the students daily to develop these neurological pathways and increase self-belief among our students. They’re a positive start to the day and only take 1 minute.

You could play a video of animations being spoken aloud that students recite back.

This video is EXCLUSIVE to my mailing list members and now to my blog followers. Here is the private link to access this video: https://youtu.be/dFUA_1GATwg

Another option is to stick them around a mirror in the classroom so that students see them when they look at themselves.

Image from Miss Jacobs Little Learners Instagram

What are the benefits?

Empirical studies found these benefits of reciting positive affirmations regularly:

1. Self-affirmations have been used effectively in interventions that led people to increase their physical behaviour (Cooke et al., 2014) 2. They have been linked positively to academic achievement by mitigating grading declines in students who feel left out at college (Layous et al., 2017) 3. Self-affirmation has been demonstrated to lower stress and rumination (Koole et al., 1999; Wiesenfeld et al., 2001).

Let your visitors in but don’t let them overstay their welcome.

When you’re in a certain emotion, it can feel like it’s never going to go. It takes over the right side of your brain and stops the logical left side from thinking straight, hijacking our sense of time. We overestimate the duration and intensity of our uncomfortable emotions and underestimate the comfortable ones.

For example, think back to a time when you felt anxious. Perhaps you were waiting for some test results. Did that wait seem to last a lifetime? Now think back to a happy time. Maybe you were on holiday with your family. Did time seem to fly by? Probably. This is called affective forecasting.

In fact, emotions come and go very quickly. They chemically come and go in ONLY 90 SECONDS!! (Dr Bolte Taylor, 2006)

They are visitors in our bodies that come to give us a message (for example, anger -the thought or event was unfair, jealousy – we would like something in our lives etc) and then they move on and leave us alone if you listen to them.

Everybody wants to feel heard. Think of a pre-speaking toddler who is trying to explain something to their confused parent. Imagine how frustrated they would get when feeling misunderstood and how this would be shown through their behaviour.

This can relate to our emotions. If you don’t listen to what they’re trying to say – for example, by blocking them out, not thinking about them, not feeling those sensations in your body, distracting yourself with work or social media, telling yourself that you’re fine – they’ll kick up a fuss, get stronger and louder and keep shouting their message at you until you listen and understand. They’re here to give you a message and they won’t give in until their task is complete. This is when an emotion can turn into a mood.

Moods are visitors here for a longer stay. They’ve bought their overnight bags and want breakfast too. They don’t want to check out and can overstay their welcome.

In order to let an emotion go, it needs to be FELT and EXPRESSED.

FEEL IT – Take the 90 seconds to stop and breathe. Take deep belly breaths and recognise what is going on inside. How does this emotion feel in your feet? legs? stomach? chest? shoulders? arms? hands? Work your way up your body. What thoughts is it creating? What is it here to tell me?
Feel those sensations and just sit with them. Feel them come and go in pulses or waves and watch them fade and disappear.

EXPRESS IT – Allow your face to show the relevant facial expression. Do what your body is telling you to do. Cry if your eyes are stinging. Shout into a pillow or squeeze your body tight if you have excess energy.
How can you express this emotion safely? If it is other peoples’ opinions that are stopping you expressing them, find a space where you can be alone. If this isn’t possible, go to the bathroom or face a wall.

Feel them and express them in the moment that they arise. By blocking them and distracting yourself, remember that they are still there. They’re still trying to give you that message. They’re not going anywhere until you do listen.

TEACHER REFLECTION:

Do you have an area in your classroom that pupils can access to be alone, to process and express their emotions by themselves? A calm corner is a great addition to any classroom and gives the pupils the message that emotions are valid and should be accepted and expressed.

When children are expressing their sadness or anger, do you reactively say “don’t cry, don’t be sad’ and “calm down”? Have you taught them how to return to calm and self-regulate their emotions? Do they know techniques to express how they’re feeling in a healthy, safe and socially-acceptable way?

Follow my blog and website for more support with this.

My classroom resources for your Calm Corner and your social, emotional and well-being lessons will be available online VERY SOON!

Mrs Morris
The Mental Health Teacher

References

BOLTE TAYLOR, Dr Jill (2006). My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist’s Personal Journey. 1st Viking ed. New York: Viking.

Government Education Recovery Commissioner Resigns just after post-COVID Funding is Allocated.

Sir Kevan Collins has resigned, saying that the £1.4 billion allocation is not enough to support a decent recovery programme for education. Hence, he has resigned as he feels that he will not be able to do it justice.

Good for him. We all know what it is like trying to do a good job of something without being given the right resources or funding needed – let alone doing it in the [very critical] public eye.

Perhaps he was hoping that this grand gesture was going to encourage Boris Johnson to increase the funding but it hasn’t. Collins was reported to be wanting around £15 billion for this mammoth task, which is a meagre amount in comparison to the £127 billion spent on public services.

In my opinion, it is the youngest generation who are high up on the most-affected by COVID list (them and the eldest generation) so as much money as needed should be spent on them but NOT ON their education. It should be spent on their mental well-being and social skills. (In my previous post, I speak about the £79 million the government have put aside for children’s mental health and discussed the issues with their plans). In years to come, the children won’t be asked about the science topic that they missed or the music lessons they went without. They will be asked about how they FELT during a worldwide pandemic. They will talk about the clap for carers, the board games they played, the time spent skyping their teacher, the masks they saw the adults wearing, the friends that they missed. NOT the lessons the missed out on.

At the end of the day, they are ALL in the same position. So surely nobody is behind, if nobody is infront?! In every classroom all over the world, the pupils are at different ability levels. Nothing new there. The pupils are likely to still be under-achievers or over-achievers, whatever they were pre-COVID.

For the months on end that they were either being home-schooled or in lockdown, the majority (?) of these children have still been educated, either by their teachers online or by their parents. It is the social skills, the face-to-face communication, the team sports, the hobbies, the interaction that they have missed out on and not advanced in.

Currently, the government are talking about spending this money on tutoring and making the school days 30 minutes longer (the latter was suggested by Collins). As a previous year 1 and 2 teacher, I know that at the end of the day, pupils are tired and hungry – not an optimal state to be learning. As for tutoring, how is this going to work? Will it be one-on-one? Delivered by teachers? Will this money subsidise tutoring payments, making it just for the more affluent pupils (when children from families receiving benefifits are statistically lower academically)?

Perhaps Collins wasn’t the right man for the job after all. Maybe the government should put their trust into the professionals hands and allow schools to decide how to spend the money that will best suit their unique set of pupils. Teaching needs to stop being an over-managed profession and the power should be in the teachers’ hands.

The Issues with Mental Health Referral Pathways in Schools. Part 1.

Between January and May 2021, I studied at the University of Derby for my Master’s Level 7 module: Children and Adolescent Mental Health and undertook a wide range of research to write this study.

I studied government policies, white papers, school policies and codes of practice to previous evidence-based studies, research-based studies and theories to form my understanding on the subject (I have put the 45+ bibliography at the end of bottom of this page).

Let’s start with an outline of children’s mental health in England today:

Mental health problems are consistently rising for the children and young people (CYP) in Britain, with behavioural and emotional disorders being the most common among 5-10 year olds (World Health Organisation, WHO, 2020). 16% of CYP have a probable mental health disorder (NHS Digital,
2020) which is the equivalent of nearly 5 children in every class of 30; an increase from 11.2% in 2017, 10.1% in 2014 and 9.7% in 1999 (NHS digital, 2017).

The Young Minds survey (2020) reported that a combined total of 83% of CYP said that the pandemic had made their mental health either ‘a bit’ or ‘much worse’ and compared to in 2017/18. Please bear in mind that the 2020 study was conducted in July and August, after the first (of three) lockdowns in England so this may be a modest number.

Why is it on the rise?

I believe it is due to the increase in social media, where online bullying and a reduction in face-to-face communication has been a secondary effect, the exam pressures that pupils now face, the pressure to look a certain way, as portrayed by celebrities and influencers we are bombarded with in marketing campaigns online and in the street and of course, COVID-19.

This increase in the amount of CYP needing professional help will add to the already extremely long waiting lists for referrals. Before the schools started back in January 2021, you could already be waiting up to 87 days before you are even seen for an initial meeting; with the country’s average being 43 days.

This is not good enough. Improved mental wellbeing is widely attributed to early identification of an issue and early intervention (Future in Mind, 2015). The time that it takes to be seen will be time that impacts on the child’s self-esteem, their self-understanding and acceptance and their education.

The government have started to introduce Mental Health Support Teams into schools (DH & DFE, 2017) which would help to shorten this waiting period, but these are still being set up and trialled in trailblazer areas (NHS, 2021). They are devised to give timely support but with 11% of clinical posts in CYP’s services being vacant (Kings Fund, 2018), staff will not be able to meet the demand. The government have ringfenced £79 million for the creation of these teams (DH, 2021) but this money would be better spent on recruiting and training more mental health professionals to meet the demand and shorten waiting times.

The Teachers’ Standards (DFE, 2013) state in the preamble that “teachers make the education of their pupils their first concern” (page 10). According
to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs (Cherry, 2018), people need to feel safe and secure and have their physiological needs met before they can learn.

Surely pupils’ health and wellbeing should be teachers’ first concern!? If children aren’t happy and healthy then we know this is a huge barrier to learning. Let alone if they’ve had enough sleep, eaten breakfast or are suffering from mental health problems. Teaching them before their needs have been met is pretty pointless. They will struggle to retain any information and focus.

Teacher workload is already through the roof, with 7 out of 10 primary teachers reporting that workload is a serious problem in the Teacher Workload Survey (DFE, 2019) so even though many, many teachers currently put their pupils’ wellbeing first, in many areas, this could be doubling their workload. In my opinion, teaching assistants are best placed to have authority over their class pupils’ mental health. They are already managing pupils’ social, emotional and behavioural issues,
often without any formal training (Groom & Rose, 2005), so having responsibility for this is a natural progression.

Many schools do not assess teaching assistants according to the results they produce (in terms of a pupil’s progress if they have worked with them 1:1). Perhaps they could have bi-annual appraisals based around the support they have provided for the pupils’ mental health. This could motivate them to provide a service of value and could be linked to their pay grades, just as a teacher’s performance is.

Teaching assistants often have a caring nature and with professional training in identifying the first signs of mental ill health, giving mental health support to mild conditions, reporting this to the relevant teacher/member of staff/parent and contacting multiagencies for more support; I believe that pupils and TAs would thrive.

Once the current TAs have been trained, this could be added onto the Teaching Assistant Apprenticeship programmes.

I envision that there would be a part-time TA based in every class which I know isn’t currently the case in some schools and they would still support during the independent activity time in lessons and could spend pockets of time (during the register, in the morning activity, during assembly, when the teacher is giving the class input, etc) focusing on their mental health responsibilities.

What do you think about using your teaching assistants in this way?

Bibliography
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Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) Association (1998). ADHD: The Facts. Adapted and updated from Peter Jaska’s article, “ADHD Facts” originally posted on the ADDA website in 1998 although an updated date was not given. Available at: https://add.org/adhd-facts/ (Accessed: 9.5.21)

Bennathan, M. (2018). The Boxall Profile Handbook (revised). London: The Nurture Group Network Ltd.

Burns, TP. (2004) Community Mental Health teams: A guide to current practices. Oxford: Oxford University Press; 2004.

CanChild Research Centre (2021). Related Disorders. Do some children with DCD have other developmental disorders? Available online: https://canchild.ca/en/diagnoses/developmental-
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Cherry, K. (2018). The Five Levels of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. Available at: https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-maslows-hierarchy-of-needs-4136760 (Accessed: 12.5.21)

Cherry, K. (2021). How Experience Changes Brain Plasticity. Available at:
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Mindfulness and the Wise Mind

In my Master’s lecture this week (I study Child & Adolescent Mental Health – level 7), we were shown this slide and it got me thinking:

On the surface our lecturer was showing that mindfulness is a relaxation tool to use to improve mental well being but I was hooked on the Venn diagram.

The ‘Reasonable Mind’ is our thinking brain for logic and reasoning and is focused on tasks, facts and statistics. This is our prefrontal-cortex and is the part of the brain that we traditionally use for thinking.

The ‘Emotional Mind’ is our limbic system. This is when our actions are governed solely by our emotions. The stronger the emotion, the less we think, we simply react without thinking about the consequences.

Both parts of our brain are very important and useful in different situations. For example, the ‘Rational Mind’ will be used when we are working or handling data and the ‘Emotional Mind’ when we are with our loved ones; but most of the time, we won’t benefit if we are using one or the other.

Let’s discuss a situation.

If you argue with your partner and are in the ‘Emotional Mind’, you may scream and shout, say things you’ll later regret and suggest that you’re better apart. You’re saying things to try and hurt your partner as much as you’re hurting inside but you’re not taking into consideration how you may feel tomorrow when you’ve calmed down. Do you really want to break up?

If you were in the ‘Rational Mind’ when you had the argument, you may suggest that each of you take it in turns to explain your point of view, then you may write a list of pros and cons and work out a solution that way but what about how you feel? With the rational mind, this doesn’t come into consideration. Using just the ‘Emotional Mind’ is like following your heart and we know that in love, nothing is rational!

So it is not great to use either mind by itself. When we combine the skill sets of both parts of our brain, this is where we connect the ‘Wise Mind’.

The ‘Wise Mind’ is reached by being MINDFUL. To do this, we are aware of our thoughts (rational) and aware of our feelings (emotional) but we distance ourselves from them. We know that not all our thoughts are true and that our feelings are derived from them. We can take a step back and let some false thoughts pass on by. We release them and let them go. In turn, this releases negative emotions that were linked to those thoughts.

In this space or peace, we can start to ‘hear’ or ‘feel’ our intuition/our gut feeling/our inner knowing.

So as we are more mindful and aware of what is going on inside ourselves (thoughts and feelings) and can let things go, we can connect more to our true selves.

When making decisions, it is always best to go with your ‘gut feeling’. This is your intuition telling you what is best for you. It may not be what will bring the best emotions or it may not be what has the most ticks on your spreadsheet, but your body knows what is best for YOU.

If you want to connect more with your body and be more mindful, then my short relaxation videos for calm, focus and mental wellness are on YouTube. My channel is ‘The Mental Health Teacher’ and teachers, you can learn the skills alongside your pupils!

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFmUuRhirRUPRtROX0KiQcw

The ‘Wise Mind’ is a core dialectical behaviour therapy (DBT) mindfulness skill, coined by Linnehan (1993).

Post-COVID Pupils

After 3 months of being home-schooled, only seeing their family, staying indoors and the highlight of their day being a walk; heading back into the colourful, busy classroom with 30 other children may seem a little daunting for our children.

I am going to discuss 3 main behaviours that may show up in your pupils which would indicate they are mentally struggling and how to support them.

They may be more emotional than usual.
They may be socially withdrawn.
They may seem very tired with little energy.

Behaviours are visible. These are what we see. What we don’t see are the needs and the emotions behind the behaviour.

Here is an example:
Need: Love and affection
Emotion: Sadness, loneliness
Behaviour: sitting by themselves, not joining in with conversations, not playing with their friends on the playground.

As teachers we need to look for these behaviours as often, children…
a) won’t realise that they have a need or that something is wrong.
b) won’t speak to somebody about their situation – to them, because it is their only experience, they are not aware that it may not be ‘normal’ or ‘acceptable’.
c) they may only show these behaviours in ‘free’ time, for example at playtime when they are free to do as they please (within limitations). In the classroom, these behaviours may not be noticed (unless they were openly expressive children beforehand), we may assume that they are being quiet, well-behaved and getting on with their tasks.

Because of this, during the first couple of weeks back to school, it would be a good opportunity to give the pupils more ‘free’ time in which they can choose their own activities or give them group tasks so that you can observe their social interactions. This will also ease their transition back to school as they may struggle to concentrate for longer periods of time.

What is important with signs of poor mental health is that these behaviours are different to what is ‘normal’ for that child. We know that every child is different – some are naturally loud and excitable whilst others are naturally shy and reserved, but what we need to take notice of is if these are unusual for that specific child, no matter what the behaviour.

It is important to record any changes in behaviour for reference and to follow your school’s policies in supporting individual pupils and perhaps speaking to your Special Educational Needs and Disabilities Co-ordinator, whilst in the meantime, here are some effective ways that you can improve your class’ mental health.

Video link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=70j3xyu7OGw&t=48s

I strongly suggest that the whole class should take part in these activities. Some children who are mentally struggling will not show any signs at all and their behaviour will appear to be the same. Other children may face challenges in a few weeks time and these techniques can help them in the future. Every body has a brain and every brain has health. It is sometimes good and sometimes poor. It is a moving scale. Everyone will face challenges in their lives. Everyone has emotions so everybody would benefit from these techniques.

When you try these with your class, let me know how they go down!

Mindfulness Studies in Schools

A large charity, Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families’ mental health are conducting the largest Mindfulness project in English schools, commissioned by the Department for Education.

This is called the ‘Education for Wellbeing’ programme, which will work with over 370 schools to evaluate pioneering ways of supporting the mental wellbeing of pupils.

There are two research projects in our programme:

AWARE project for Year 9, implementing and evaluating:
- Youth Aware of Mental Health (YAM) – a mental health promotion programme delivered by external professionals over five consecutive weeks.
- The Mental Health and High Schools Curriculum Guide (The Guide) – a mental health literacy curriculum delivered by teachers through six lessons lasting 45 – 60 mins each.

INSPIRE project for Years 7 and 8, implementing and evaluating:
- Mindfulness – delivered for 5 minutes on a daily basis by trained school staff.
- Strategies for Safety and Wellbeing – eight consecutive weekly lessons each lasting 45 minutes delivered by trained school staff.
- Relaxation – delivered for 5 minutes on a daily basis by trained school staff.

Participating schools will be randomly allocated to deliver one of the above interventions or to continue with their usual practice. The first wave of the project is already underway and schools start delivery in January 2019.

They are now recruiting mainstream secondary schools to take part in the second wave of our research, delivering the interventions next academic year (2019-2020). Schools allocated to an intervention delivered by school staff will receive free training from the Centre. All participating schools will be remunerated £1000, so if you’re interested, please get in touch with them!

I think that this study will be fantastic because the mindfulness sessions are 5 minutes long a day – just the same as the practices in my mindfulness programme. I believe that any longer then children (or adults!) will struggle to focus and it is important to make this a daily practise so that they learn the skill and t becomes a habit. This is unlike the Paws.b program that some schools follow which is a short series of hour-long mindfulness sessions.

I am sure that this study will find positive results like I have in my studies and that the teachers and children in the participating schools will love mindfulness!

How to use Mindfulness Teacher Scripts in the Classroom.

Hi to all my new followers!

3 brains

Thank you for subscribing to the blog now that my website has gone live! I’ve been blown away by the amount of downloads for the teacher scripts! I’m so happy that teachers all over the WORLD will be using them in their classrooms! Teachers in the UK, USA & Australia have all been downloading!

We are the first business to create mindfulness scripts. I haven’t seen them anywhere else, but maybe that is because there aren’t many other people offering mindfulness resources to schools. I think that scripts are essential for teachers who want to introduce mindfulness to their classes but they don’t quite know what it is themselves or they might not feel confident to.

Our scripts tell you EXACTLY what that mindfulness exercise is for, how it will benefit the children and what to say. There are NO RESOURCES needed for our mindfulness practises as I want them to be as easy as possible for teachers…we don’t need any more things on our to do lists!!

At the top of all of our scripts are the following sections:

screen shot - teacher notes

Frequency (how often to do this mindfulness practice).
Duration (how long it will last).
Skills being developed.
Classroom set up (how best to sit the children). In here I mention the use of a bell to signal the start and end of the mindfulness practice – you can use a musical instrument from school that resonates. This is good to set the tone and signals to the children to be silent.

Then the teacher script will begin; just simply read what is on there to the class and you will be leading them through a mindfulness practice. When you have repeated this script a few times (I recommend doing the same one every day for a week so that they get used to it and then doing it once a week alongside other practices) then you will also be more familiar with it and you can join in too.

It would be great for your mental well-being and be a few minutes of chill out of your day.

screen shot - poster

On my website, this poster is available to download for free to explain to your class what mindfulness is before you first practise it (or hopefully the attachment below will work).

what is mindfulness poster.

www.themindfulnessteacher.com

The code NEWYEAR299 is still valid until the end of January so use it now to download your first teacher script for FREE!