We were very content and calmed to award Almond Hill Junior School (Stevenage) an award to support mindfulness and relaxation. The award will cover training sessions for staff and resources such as mats and music etc.
Almond Hill’s headteacher, Judith Lovelock made a strong bid which explained the many aspects and benefits of the project:
As part of our school PE plan and as an objective in our School Improvement Plan this year to support pupil's emotional wellbeing and mental health, we have an objective to train staff to develop mindfulness and relaxation. We want to use mindfulness in all lessons but particularly within PE where some children with social and emotional needs often find it hard to govern their emotions and this limits participation and co-operation. We want to offer mindfulness training to all our staff.
Our PE lead runs a weekly 'nurture' group for vulnerable children and training will enable mindfulness to be offered as a programme of intervention in these sessions. It will enable our pastoral teaching assistant to organise daily mindfulness sessions in our lunchtime Friendship Room.
We also wish to offer an extra-curricular mindfulness club following training.
Our final aim is to inform carers/adult of our work and encourage them to use mindfulness techniques at home.