The Garrison Institute’s Initiative on Contemplative Education
The field of “contemplative teaching and learning” is growing fast – it focuses on deepening education and supporting teachers and students by building inner strengths and skills including attention, self-regulation, compassion and resilience. While the national discourse on education focuses on salient issues like testing, teacher pay and job security, and other mounting stresses on teachers and students, a growing body of research and field practice demonstrates that working on a more subjective, inward level -- using secular, accessible techniques ranging from mindfulness practices to yoga to reflective journaling -- may hold the key to coping with these stresses more successfully.
Contemplative activity strengthens skills such as attunement with others, emotional self-regulation, awareness, resilience, flexibility, insight, empathy, intuition and morality. Building these skills enhances a broad range of K-12 educational outcomes, from academic achievement to social and emotional learning.
CARE (Cultivating Awareness and Resilience in Education)is the Institute’s professional development program designed to help K-12 teachers reduce stress, improve mental concentration, enhance emotional awareness and responsiveness and create better learning environments for students. CARE has now completed a two-year, in-depth pilot to refine the training and test its impact across multiple school districts in Pennsylvania, culminating in a randomized controlled trial. Funded by the US Department of Education's Institute of Education Sciences (IES grant #R305A090179), preliminary analysis of the research is described in a recent article in the peer-reviewed Journal of Classroom Interaction, and in a new book on teacher education. The data indicates CARE is a promising tool to help teachers create and maintain a positive classroom learning environment, avoid burnout and attrition, and enjoy and excel in their work.
- Foster the growth of the emerging field of contemplative education for K-12 educators and classrooms;
- Introducing evidence-based, accessible, secular contemplative methods to educators;
- Host high-level forums that facilitate dialogue among educators, scientists, funders and policy makers, about the development and implementation of contemplative- based teacher trainings;
- Host public symposia and CARE trainings for teachers and educators
- Research and develop evidence-based, contemplative-based tools and trainings for K-12 educators;
- Conduct classroom pilot programs and in-depth research on impacts of contemplative education interventions on teachers and classrooms;
- Disseminate this work by creating publications and other resources for educators, researchers, teachers and schools.
The field of contemplative education continues to advance and mature. Contemplative teaching and learning become widely accepted and significant factors in improving student academic performance, reducing teacher burnout and creating healthy school environments conducive to children becoming responsible, productive, caring adults. As it grows and gains recognition, this emerging field helps redress the ongoing crisis in American education. Today nearly half of all K-12 teachers quit during their first five years, a quarter of students don’t graduate from high school (percentages are much higher among minorities) and five percent of schools are labeled as failing (percentages are much higher in urban areas). The growth of contemplative education helps keep teachers teaching, keep students learning and help schools succeed.
November 4-6, 2011 ICE will host a major education symposium, open to the public, on “Advancing the Science and Practice of Contemplative Teaching and Learning.” Gathering educators and other relevant professionals from across the US and around the world, it will examine the scientific basis of contemplative teaching and learning, discuss benefits of introducing it into mainstream education and showcase contemplative teaching and learning programs that have demonstrated positive outcomes in a “Marketplace of Ideas,” a poster-type session.
Group posts
No posts.
The Garrison Institute’s Initiative on Contemplative Education
