This interactive workshop will provide participants with an introduction to Mindfulness in Education via specific strategies they will learn and explore. A text-based protocol will be used as a catalyst for discussion, discourse and debate around mindfulness to surface bias. We will also draw from the diverse knowledge and experience of our participants to explore how mindfulness practices might be used to identify, interrupt and transform bias into awareness, acceptance and tolerance of self and others in the school environment: from classrooms to hallways to staff meetings and parent-teacher night.
Kate Johnson is an educator, meditator, and anti-oppression trainer. She worked as a teaching artist and mindfulness coach in NYC public schools for over 10 years. Currently, Kate teaches mindful movement and meditation to people of all ages in classrooms, public health centers and social justice nonprofits, and facilitates awareness-based, embodied approaches to organizational development, diversity and inclusion training. She received a BFA in Dance from The Alvin Ailey School/ Fordham University, an MA in Performance Studies from New York University. Her first book, Friendship As Freedom: Mindful Practices for Resisting Oppression and Building Community, will be published by Parallax Press in Spring 2018.
As a beginning teacher in the NYCDOE in 1997 Barnaby was introduced to and began applying secular, non-sectarian mindfulness practices to support own professional practice while teaching students in the women’s facility at Rikers Island.
Successful outcomes and discoveries compelled him to dedicate himself to understanding the ways in which yoga and mindfulness programs might help students in the NYCDOE to help themselves in ways that support their social, emotional and academic learning while also empowering them to be engaged, self-advocating, citizens in an increasingly complex and ever-changing society.
He is both a trained meditation guide and a certified yoga teacher as well as a licensed pedagogue, former dean of students and high school building principal. He now serves on the city-wide Office of Field Support and serves on that team as the Senior Program Manager of Special Projects and Initiatives. One of his work streams is connected to providing introductory mindfulness presentations and Field Support Center-based mindfulness intensives throughout the five boroughs. He has presented on mindfulness in education and mindfulness to support culturally responsive educational environments at national and international educational conferences. He is excited to be returning the EDxED NYC 2017 Conference and to be co-facilitating this year with Ms. Kate Johnson.