Every six weeks, I teach a 6-week course on how to bring mindfulness to children and teens. Each two-hour class of the 6-class series is offered via Skype. We study many topics, including the theory and practice of various ways of teaching, how to interest young people in these techniques, and how to talk to teachers, parents, and schools about the value of mindfulness. I provide personalized mindfulness instruction via email to each participant several days a week. There are a minimum of five students and a maximum of twelve students in each class. The class is offered on a "dana" (by donation) basis. Everyone who participates is asked to donate, even if the donation is only $1.00, and the recommended donation for each participant is 0.5% of his or her annual income. Every dollar given will be used to support my mindfulness programs. None of it will go to me personally. The classes are based on the brilliant mindfulness teachings of Shinzen Young. Shinzen Young has identified common elements that all spiritual and secular practices of mindfulness share and organized these elements into categories. Taken together, every human experience can be said to be composed of some combination of the elements in these categories. I have experienced great success teaching this system to youth in a completely secular manner. Two years ago, I started the Mind the Music program for teens at King Street Youth Center in Burlington, Vermont. This program teaches mindfulness to teens using music as the object of concentration and as a vehicle for observing the wide array of subjective and objective human experience. The teen program at the center serves 40 to 50 teens per day, and most of them choose to regularly attend Mind the Music. I also teach in public schools. I have worked with hundreds of teachers and thousands of students, bringing mindfulness into education with a simple curriculum that is designed to be easy for students - and school boards - to understand. I also offered my instruction this past summer to teens attending the Omega Teen Camp in upstate New York, and have taught mindfulness to youth through tennis. If you are interested in attending one of the 6-session classes for teaching mindfulness to youth, please contact me here. For further information: Link to a description of the Mind the Music Program Link to YouTube clips of youth who attend the program speaking about it Link to Shinzen Young's home practice program: http://basicmindfulness.org/ Shinzen Young's website: http://www.shinzen.org/ |
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