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From: Ellen-Marie Silverman
Date: 10/13/03
Time: 8:59:54 PM
Remote Name: 172.156.206.237
Hello, Theresa,
You know, you raised a very interesting issue, that of teaching meditation to children. But before I share my few thoughts on that subject, let me try to distinguish meditation from relaxation -- briefly. The various meditation practices I know of lead to a heightened personal and transcendant awareness by learning to tame the mind, i.e., turning off its incessant chatter, and allowing reality (inner and outer) to be experienced as it is. Relaxation techniques release bodily tension, which can help the mind's attunement to the present.
I have heard of videos available to teach children to meditate, but I have not viewed any of them, and I know of some very special people, e.g., Dora Kunz, co-founder with Delores Kreiger, RN, PhD, of Therapeutic Touch, and former president of the Theosophical Society, who meditated as children, but, like any other skill taught to a child, the teaching of meditation has to be undertaken very thoughtfully and introduced by highly skilled teachers. As an SLP, unless I was a teacher of meditation experienced in teaching children, I would not teach an underage client to meditate and then only if I had the express consent of the child's caregivers to do so (if the child was in other respects a good candidate --- had a good attention span and showed interest).
I have heard that relaxation techniques, such as progressive relaxation, head and neck rolls, rag doll, have been used with children who have developed hyperfunctional voice disorders, but I'm not well-informed about their application to speech therapy with children to say more now.
Meditation "in the moment" techniques, such as tonglen "on the spot" as taught by Pema Chodron, walking meditation by Thich Nhat Hanh, conscious eating taught by Jon Kabat-Zinn, etc., are the goal of some who practice sitting meditation. The Insight Meditation Society teachers and co-founders, especially Jack Kornfield, teach breath awareness as a way of becoming attuned to bodily sensations, states of mind, feelings, sounds, "the very stuff of our lifes" so that when we go about our daily life, we can live in heightened awareness in a calm, thoughtful, aware way. Lama Surya Das, an American who studied Tibetan Buddhism and the author of the best-selling book, "Awakening the Buddha Within," also presents some techniques for practicing "in the moment" meditation.
I hope you find satisfaction in your study of meditation and learn: "Who we are is more important than anything else."
Ellen-Marie Silverman