Contemplative Practice in the Classroom: Trends in Higher Education OFD Faculty Fellowship

 developing awareness of the self and one's environment  fostering communion and connection with others Contemplative Practices

“Synaptogenesis Exercises”… I mean “Attention Training”… erm… “Mindfulness Meditation” The Neuroscientific Approach to Understanding Contemplative Practice

 Meditation  Relaxation  Hippies  Out-of-body experiences, man, whoa.  Neuroscience? What do you think of when you think of mindfulness?

 Present-moment awareness  concentration meditation  open monitoring  Attitude of nonjudgment and acceptance  nonstriving  beginner’s mind  patience What is Mindfulness Meditation?

 Long literature of mindfulness-based stress reduction  Benefits:  Anxiety disorders  Depression  Behavior disorders  Chronic pain  More recent research suggests that emotion-related changes may be an indirect effect! Psychology – Roots are in MBSR

So what’s the mechanism? What aspects of human behavior/psychology actually change as a DIRECT result of mindfulness practice?

 Recent barrage of research showing structural changes associated with mindfulness practice  Size  Density  Connectivity Structural Neuroimaging

Increases in Cortical Thickness Grant, et al., 2010

1 mm 3

Increases in Cortical Thickness Lazar, et al., 2005

Increases in Grey Matter Volume Luders, et al., 2009

Increases in Connectivity Brewer, et al., 2011

Connectivity Luders, et al., 2011

Age-Related Cortical Atrophy

 Long-term potentiation  The neural process of learning  “Neurons that fire together, wire together.” – Hebbian postulate What causes structural change in the brain?

Long-Term Potentiation Synaptogenesis

 Ever feel really spacey when you’re stressed out?  Stress produces many hormones, including glucocorticoids which act as neurotransmitters in the brain  Glucocorticoids exhaust neurons when they can’t get a break from exposure to stress hormones  This disrupts Long-Term Potentiation  Especially in the hippocampus – the part of our brain that helps create long-term memories! Stress and Long-Term Potentiation

 Our culture is designed to distract us away from the present moment…  Billboards take you to tropic isles and fantasy lands  Deadlines and due dates keep you preoccupied with the future  Over-stimulation scatter you all over – your phone beeps, your computer updates, an comes in, commercials interrupt you, people pop in Mindfulness as Attention Training

 Our culture teaches us to not be happy with our current state…  We can always be better, which causes guilt and rumination on the past  We are taught to evaluate and place a value judgment on everything, and we do this pretty automatically Mindfulness as Attention Training

 All this distracts us from actually experiencing the current moment. Instead we mind-wander, and even if we do stay present we spend our time judging/evaluating rather than experiencing.  As a result, when we need to focus our attention on right now, those neural circuits are weak and inefficient. Mindfulness practice helps you do reps with those neurons. Mindfulness as Attention Training

 Some studies report that we spend up to 50% of our waking hours mind-wandering!  The zenned-out depiction of mindfulness is not very accurate.  Takes work and time  Can’t expect immediate effects Mindfulness Takes Practice

 Audio/Awareness-of-Breath.mp3 Audio/Awareness-of-Breath.mp3  15 min guided breath awareness audio   10 min guided mindfulness meditation video  On-line Meditation Timers   Phone apps  meditation/id ?mt=8 meditation/id ?mt=8 Time to Practice

Current Research with Maureen Hall

 Title: Contemplative Practices in the Classroom: Trends in Higher Education  Investigators (co-investigators): Aminda O’Hare  Hypothesis, Research Questions, or Goals of the Project  The goals of this project are to incorporate contemplative practices into the teaching pedagogies of several UMASS Dartmouth courses and assess the impact of these practices on student’s learning, emotional well-being, and cognitive ability. This project is part of the Office of Faculty Development Faculty Fellowship awarded to Aminda O’Hare for the academic year, which is based off of O’Hare and Hall’s current IRB project “Neural and Classroom Learning Assessments of Cognitive Improvements Following Training in Contemplative Practices” (#13.059).  Research Method, Design, and Proposed Statistical Analysis:  As part of Aminda O’Hare’s OFD Faculty Fellowship, ten other faculty members from the UMASS Dartmouth campus will be implementing elements of contemplative practices into their standard classroom teaching practices. Each faculty member will have one class that receives the implementation and another that does not, for comparison purposes. While each faculty member will be assessing the learning outcomes of these implementations in their own ways, as best suits their course, O’Hare will be collecting pre- and post- implementation measures across all courses. These measures will include surveys that assess personality and cognitive ability (see attached descriptions and examples). Current IRB

 “…when I look at the malfeasance of well-educated leaders in business and finance, in health care and education, in politics and religion, I see too many people whose expert knowledge – and the power that comes with it – has not been joined to a professional ethic, a sense of communal responsibility, or even simple compassion.”  “Objectivism begins as an epistemology rooted in a false conception of science that insists on a wall of separation between the knower and the known.” From: Parker Palmer’s (2014). Forward to Contemplative Practices in Higher Education

 Stress reduction/management outside of classroom  Get students focused on class  Help students be more thoughtful of self  Help students be better group members  Help students regulate emotional reactions > better critical thinking, decision making, discussion contributions Contemplative Practices in Higher Education

 Different types of meditation  Reflective writing  Moments of silence  “Slow learning” From your applications…

 Any new class manipulation has the potential to impact your teaching evaluations negatively.  Not all of your students will like this.  Some of your students have not spent much time reflecting on themselves or others. They may get freaked out. Some Disclaimers

 My personal & research values combined.  What about for you? The Value of Contemplative Practice?