Inquiry - What is mindfulness?

I am very interested to learn about mindfulness. My students have made huge progress since the beginning of the year. They are more willing to take risks. The more I keep to my routine and make the transition into class easy, the more they calm down, however, I still find that they are very hyped up after any activities outside the class e.g. Kapa Haka or assembly.  My hunch is that they get over stimulated and find it hard to calm down or they are just tired and don't want to go straight back into learning.  I tried letting them lie down and listen to a story, but was surprised to find about 6 of them, struggling to settle, to such a point that I had to stop trying, but the class was immediately a bit calmer due to the rest of the class having 3 minutes "resting time".

My DP suggested Sparklers Christchurch website. I started the one activity where they lie down for 30seconds without talking, just listening to their breathing. I still have 2 students that cannot settle. But it is becoming easier for the rest. I have 2 boys that is able to immediately relax and nearly falls asleep.

Then I watched 1 News Now where Point England's principal advises that mindfulness
training is the thing that will make a huge positive change in the behaviour of school students.

So....what is mindfulness really? How can it improve my children's performance in school work and behaviour? Is this the magic pill that will improve co-operation, kindness and volume levels in my class? Will this help my students with coping strategies when they feel angry and teach them patience?

So I snooped around on Google and found this...

This linked in with the observation that Susan(Our science tutor) and I observed during a science lesson. The children could not identify feelings or read expressions. So we worked a little on emotions. It seems like mindfulness can build on this. 

Here is a website with some ideas of mind fullness activities. Teacher Starter

Next step: 

Find out what mind fullness really is, how it works and how can this help my students. (Exciting)

Kaitiakitanga -Science

For term 3 we are working on a big idea in science: My big idea is to show that even little children can make a difference caring for the environment,.The route that I want to take is to work from a point of making them aware of life under the ground, and then working toward the value of keeping our grounds clean, and how a worm farm can support us in looking after our environment.

Week 1 we created a demarcation to investigate over a few weeks. We took some rocks and placed them on healthy grass in order to see how it will change. Last week, I gave the children a clipboard with a mini beasts spotting chart, and a table where they could jot down the insects they do spot under the logs and rocks. They had to draw it, name it, identify how many legs, whether they had wings, etc. We also looked at bones and examples of invertebrates and vertebrates.

Initially I did not think they would be able to do the activity, but was surprised that they were able to complete the task, with the exception of 2 or 3 children. The children seems very interested in the activities,  and is eager to learn about the critters.

Although I got this idea from Susan, I try to modify it a little and bring in a variety of activities to enforce the learning. My focus for myself was to explicitly introduce vocaublary, get them interested and excited about science, and observe change.

What I am struggling with is to explain why things are the way they are, due to my own lack of knowledge. When I know I am introducing things, I ensure that I am prepared and know how to explain it, but sometimes the children come up with questions on the spot, and I can't really answer them. E.g. why are the insects under the rocks and scurry away when you lift it up.

So what:
what I thought I could do is to write their questions down, do the research and give them the answers the following week.

Also, I am not yet using the questions as Susan has suggested we do. I want them to start wondering about things. So I should print those questions/prompts, or decide which one I want to focus on and add it to my planning.