#mindfulAISD (10/17)

Mindfulness in the Austin Independent School District

#mindfulAISD (10/17)Mindfulness in the Austin Independent School District

Week of October 17th

Welcome to the #mindfulAISD newsletter for the week of October 17th. This will serve as a way to highlight the awesome mindfulness work being done across the district as well as offer resources. Have suggestions for material you'd like to see on here? Please email the SEL Mindfulness Specialist: james.butler@austinisd.org

#mindfulAISD HAPPENINGS

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Clifton Career Development School

See the tweet.


#AISDProud to have #mindfulAISD Mr. Butler show @cliftoncds students tools that help us be calm, focused, & effective learners & teachers.


Kim Wine, amazing Child Development & Child Guidance Teacher at Clifton, introduced her students to mindfulness to use as self-care strategies, as well as tools for when her students work as teachers in child care.

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Mindfulness as Intervention Update--Becker Elementary

See the tweet.


Great meeting for Mindfulness Room (as intervention) @BeckerElem. To be completed by Thanksgiving. @AustinISDSEL @AISDSupt #mindfulAISD


Plans are in place and AISD's first Mindfulness Room, to be used as intervention, will be completed by Thanksgiving. Kudos to Becker principal, Valerie Borchers, for piloting such an innovative and compassionate way to handle discipline.

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#mindfulAISD at SXSWedu!!!!

See the tweet.


#SXSWeduSneakPeek An exploration into implementing #mindfulness. https://youtu.be/IGhDmOXKOiA @mrbutler629 @SelHilary @JCLittlefield #SEL


Our proposal to present a workshop at SXSWedu regarding Mindfulness in Austin ISD has been accepted and our video is being featured in their #SXSWeduSneakPeek! Thanks to everyone who voted for us to get in! Shout out to SEL Specialists Hilary Simon & Jason Littlefield for their great work with mindfulness in AISD. I'm excited to present with them.

Want to Showcase Your Mindfulness Work?

Send James Butler an email with a brief story and/or photo (if you have photo releases for your students). Or if you're on Twitter, use the hashtag #mindfulAISD and I'll post a link to your tweet on the newsletter.

RESOURCES

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Looking to Highlight AISD Teachers!

I would like to feature some AISD teachers who are practicing mindfulness with their students in these newsletters. I feel like one of the best ways to learn is from our peers, so if you're interested in sharing how you implement mindfulness in your classroom, please fill out this very brief Google Form. It should only take a couple minutes to complete. Thanks for sharing your awesome work with your colleagues! Responses will be used in future newsletters.
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***Coming in November: AISD Mindfulness Challenge***

November is a crazy time of the year for teachers with all the grading and holiday craze, so we're going to have a district-wide Mindfulness Challenge. The idea is to help us be intentional about taking care of ourselves. One way to prepare is by downloading the "Calm" app and signing up for the free lifetime subscription if you haven't done so already. Details regarding Calm sign up are below in the "Free For Teachers" section.


Specifics regarding the Mindfulness Challenge will come next week. It's not going to be a competition of any sort, rather just a way to help us motivate each other to take care of ourselves through mindfulness during a typically stressful time of the year.

"Just Breathe"

A great video from Mindful Schools. Here is an excerpt from the YouTube page about the video: "The film is entirely unscripted – what the kids say is based purely on their own neuro-scientific understanding of difficult emotions, and how they cope through breathing and meditation."
"Just Breathe" by Julie Bayer Salzman & Josh Salzman (Wavecrest Films)
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Mindful Classrooms--Week 9

If you're using Mindful Classrooms: The Educator Guide, I recommend using Week 9 this week. It's a very loose recommendation though. Please do what's best for you and your students. If you'd like the free electronic copy of the book, please feel out the Google Form at the bottom of this page.


Photos/stories of Mindful Classrooms being used in class are always welcome and would be great for the newsletter! Email James Butler.

FREE FOR TEACHERS!

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Calm

FREE Calm.com Lifetime Subscription for Teachers (PreK-12)


If you haven't done this yet, I HIGHLY recommend it. Click on the above link and fill out the quick form for a FREE lifetime subscription. It's a $300 value and they are giving it away for free to teachers!


Calm also has an app for phones.


**There are free sections on calm.com and the app, so feel free to share with your students' families.

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Mind Yeti

Connecting Mindfulness w/ Explicit SEL Lessons


Mindyeti.com is a great resource that connects mindfulness with Second Step lessons. Visit the site and sign up for a FREE account!


There is also an informational page that explains the connection between Mind Yeti and Second Step.


**Parents/guardians can also sign up for a free account. Share with your students' families!
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GoNoodle

GoNoodle For the Body and the Mind


Go to the CATEGORIES tab at the top of the page and look for "calming" and "stretching." They have a bunch of great videos to use for daily mindfulness time and/or mindfulness breaks. GoNoodle can be found in the AISD cloud and then you have access to GoNoodle Plus with ALL of the videos.


**Share gonoodle.com with your students' families so they can sign up for a FREE account to use at home.

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Pokemon Poses (created by AISD 3rd graders)

List of Pokemon Poses created by AISD Students


Mrs. Garcia's 3rd graders at Cunningham created Pokemon Yoga Poses for Market Day last week and they wanted to share their creativity and hard work with y'all. Creating poses and incorporating mindful breathing with the poses is such a great way to make mindfulness fun and easily practiced by all. Nicely done!

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Mindful Life Project

Guided Mindfulness Activities in English & Spanish--Great for Secondary


Mindful Life Project is an incredible organization based out of Richmond, CA. They teach mindfulness, yoga, expressive arts, and hip-hop/performing arts to elementary and middle school students in underserved communities.


They also have a free app titled "Mindful Life Project."

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Stop, Breathe & Think

Stop Breathe & Think is a website and app that provides guided meditations based on how you are feeling at that moment. There are a great number of FREE meditations starting at just a couple minutes long.

Sign Up for Mindfulness Support

If you haven't filled out the #mindfulAISD Google Form (below) and want to highlight your work and/or receive mindfulness support, please check it out. It only takes about 1 minute to complete. Know someone in AISD interested in mindfulness? Send them this newsletter for them to fill out the Google Form.
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Contact

James Butler

SEL Mindfulness Specialist


james.butler@austinisd.org