Self-regulation skills, and especially focus and motivation, are vital for positive learning experiences. This project explores how contemplative education practices, such as awareness meditation and introspection, affect student self-regulation of focus and motivation in an academic setting. To answer the research question, student self-evaluations, teacher and observer evaluations, and interview data were collected.

Background information

Students’ ability to self-regulate is crucial for their academic and professional development. In the course ‘History of the Middle East’, two contemplative education practices were integrated during class meetings. The first practice, awareness meditation, taught students to perceive the cognitive and emotional processes that occur in their minds. The teacher used the beginning and end of every class meeting to guide an awareness meditation, focusing on three elements: awareness of the space, awareness of the body, awareness of mental phenomena (thoughts, emotions, moods), with special attention to motivation. The second practice, inspired by the Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) matrix, encouraged students to further reflect on their behavioral patterns and to consider self-regulatory choices to improve their focus and motivation.

 Aims

This project aims to examine how integrating contemplative education techniques into course activities influences students’ focus and motivation. This will be done by answering the following research question:

• Is a contemplative education component in a content course (carried out during all course meetings) helpful for students to become aware of their motivation and regulate their focus?

Project description

The original plan, to investigate whether prior knowledge of contemplative techniques is necessary to improve self-regulation, did not proceed. As a result, none of the students had any previous exposure to awareness meditation or the ACT matrix. Therefore, explicit terminology and metaphors of the ACT matrix was not used. To evaluate the impact of the short awareness meditation and reflection questions inspired by ACT, on two occasions during the course students were invited to complete questionnaires in which they evaluated their self-perceived ability to regulate motivation and focus. These moments of evaluation were supplemented by observations reports of the teacher and a neutral observer discussing, in the former case, the experience of fluctuating student focus and motivation and, in the latter case, observable student behaviors indicating the absence or presence of focus and motivation.

Results & Conclusions

It turned out that teacher did not have enough time and space to observe the students. However, the teacher noticed an improvement in students’ focus, motivation and engagement in the classroom. The neutral observer, who observed students twice from the back of the classroom and once from the front, noticed a correlation between students’ engagement in the classroom including participation in the awareness meditation and their usage of non-study related websites. Specific teacher interventions tended to have a positive impact on student engagement, for example, if an open question proved difficult, changing it to a yes/no question with a raise of hands, loosened students up and motivated them to engage in the conversation. Over time, the number of student question increased, indicating an improvement in overall group focus. Student interviews confirmed that the short awareness meditation at the start and end of the class helped students be present, connect to the course material, and stay engaged. The results of the questionnaire did not seem to provide any additional data to complement observations and interview.

References

• Jha, A. P., Krompinger, J., & Baime, M. J. (2007). Mindfulness training modifies subsystems of attention. Cognitive, affective & behavioral neuroscience, 7(2), 109–119. https://doi.org/10.3758/cabn.7.2.109
• Goleman, D., & Davidson, R. J. (2017). Altered Traits: Science Reveals How Meditation Changes Your Mind, Brain, and Body. Avery.
• Mrazek, M. D., Franklin, M. S., Phillips, D. T., Baird, B., & Schooler, J. W. (2013). Mindfulness training improves working memory capacity and GRE performance while reducing mind wandering. Psychological science, 24(5), 776–781. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797612459659
• Kevin L. Polk. 2014. The ACT Matrix: A New Approach to Building Psychological Flexibility across Settings & Populations. 1st ed. Oakland, California: New Harbinger Publications, Inc.

• Waters, L., Barsky, A., Ridd, A. et al. Contemplative Education: A Systematic, Evidence-Based Review of the effect of Meditation Interventions in Schools. Educational Psychological Review, 27, 103–134 (2015). https://doi-org.utrechtuniversity.idm.oclc.org/10.1007/s10648-014-9258-2