Teaching - pause, breathe, smile!

 Taught the lesson around breathing circles.

The class I relieve in regularly often includes meditation as part of their prayer in the morning. They are used to listening to the ring of a bell, meditating for about 4 minutes and then returning to the class program on the ring of the bell for the second time. 

Later in the day we did some of lesson four in the Pause, breathe, smile programme. I worked through the feeling sound track and the follow up in their student booklets. As a group we reflected and talked about noticing our feelings at different times of the day for example as we come home from school, before w ego to sleep, and when we wake up. We thought about how we might feel during these check in times. The class was encouraged to come back to class to share their findings and feelings. 

I could see the value in this lesson. It took me on my own journey of feelings, being grateful to collect my young child from daycare after he has had a few days of being very cuddly. 

I noticed the students reflecting and discussing their feelings giving labels to these. They told me they had been working on dropping an anchor and how the two lessons can fit together. First recognising their feelings and if they need to, they can drop an anchor to help ground themselves if required. 

To finish we drew and cut out circles. As we drew pictures inside them we thought about placement, eg drawing a finger swipe around the outside we would breathe in along the sky, pause at the sun and hold our breathe through the cloud, letting our breath out as we close the circle drawing perhaps using the imagery of water until we get to where we started with our finger. 

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