MINDFULNESS OF THE TEACHERS: BETTER EDUCATIONAL ECOSYSTEMS FOR ALL
Istanbul University (TURKEY)
About this paper:
Conference name: 9th annual International Conference of Education, Research and Innovation
Dates: 14-16 November, 2016
Location: Seville, Spain
Abstract:
The teachers are important changing agents in empowering not only the students’ academic achievement, emotional and social development, but also the parents’ positive involvement and engagement. Therefore, the higher the teachers have the mindfulness, the better the school has the motivational ecosystems. The studies have showed that the teachers who have high level of mindfulness, the more significant decrease is seen in emotional problems of the teachers as well as the students, who affect indirectly the parents. The teachers with high mindfulness have better organization and performance in the classrooms. Therefore, those students who have teachers with high mindfulness have less concentration problems, but high academic achievement and tenacity.
This research had been conducted to compare and contrast the effects between the teachers with mindfulness and the teachers without mindfulness on the students’ academic achievement, concentration, and tenacity. The participants (n=156) were selected among the five high schools. The two separate groups were done according to the impressions of the high school principals about the teachers, academic achievements and tenacity of the students, and the declaration of the counselors for the students who had the concentration problems. All the data were collected through the mindfulness assessments and classified with the academic achievement, tenacity, and concentration problem.
The result had showed that the teachers who were pointed out as mindful had less emotional, personal, and social problems comparing to other teachers who were not defined as mindful. In the classroom where the teachers with high mindfulness had better academic achievement, particularly in math and science comparing to other teachers who had less mindfulness. Furthermore, the teachers with high mindfulness were better mentors in empowering and encouraging the students in their careers. They not only spent their time in teaching, but also in mentoring and coaching them in getting other skills, like time management in the real life. Hence, most of the students had better tenacity to be persistent and resilient in their academic lives as well as in their personal and social lives. Those students had better communication with their parents comparing to other students who had less teachers’ mindfulness. In addition to tenacity, the concentration level was 67% higher than the other group due to the fact that these teachers created better wellbeing and classroom climate in which the students were more involved in taking responsibilities. They were less stressful in dealing with different tasks and responsibilities. They were challenged and highly motivated to be successful academically and personally. They had much better close connection with their teachers than those students who had teachers with less mindfulness.
Although most of the attention related to academic achievements, tenacity, and concentration problems were on the shoulder of the students, a few had been interested in the mindfulness of the teachers. However, the training about the mindfulness would improve the ability of sustainable healthy engagement in emotional regulations and competencies, which encouraged the students’ academic achievement, tenacity, and decreased concentration problems. Hence, the mindfulness is the new agenda of the school leaders in improving the well being of their schools and the stakeholders of the environmental ecosystems.Keywords:
Mindfulness, Teachers, Educational Ecosystems, Wellbeing, Effective Leadership, Academic Achievement, Concentration Problem, Tenacity, Math and Science Teaching.