Powering SEL: The Dynamic Mindfulness (DMind) Approach

In today’s increasingly fast-paced world, stress, anxiety, and burnout affect adults and children alike. In decades past, youth did not generally have to deal with triggering content on social media, maintain grueling weekly schedules, encounter terrifying violence in school, or worry about the planet’s future. The need for effective coping skills has never been more critical.

Today’s social problems are complex, but Dynamic Mindfulness (DMind) presents a simple yet powerful toolkit for well-being, beginning with greater stress resilience. DMind offers an accessible, trauma-informed approach to developing essential life skills through practices that integrate gentle movement, breathwork, and centering techniques. These practices are designed to foster resilience, self-awareness, emotional regulation, and healthy relationships. And, research has shown them to be effective in enhancing executive function and supporting mental health.

In this article, we describe the practice of Dynamic Mindfulness, outline its benefits, and demonstrate how it can support and enhance Social Emotional Learning.

What is Dynamic Mindfulness?

Dynamic Mindfulness is a movement-based and trauma-informed approach to mindfulness. Similar to other SEL programs, DMind can help children, educators, parents, caregivers and others develop skills for self-awareness, self-management, responsible decision-making, successful relationship-building, and social consciousness.

Students engaging in Dynamic Mindfulness practices at school

There are three main components that differentiate DMind practices from other traditional mindfulness or meditation techniques:

1. Movement-based Mindfulness

Sitting still for meditation can be a challenging task, as you’re asking yourself to detach what’s going on in your mind from what’s going on in your body. Instead, DMind purposefully incorporates gentle movement, breath work, and centering techniques to make practice more accessible and engaging. This helps make us more aware of our bodies and how they react to changing circumstances. In turn, this empowers us to regulate our emotional responses to external stimuli.

2. Adaptive Mindfulness Practices

There’s no ‘one size fits all’ way to practice. DMind exercises can be adapted to serve people of all ages and abilities in diverse settings such as schools, homes, workplaces, and beyond. The various practices also serve different purposes, tailored to suit what you’re going through at the moment.

3. Accessible Mindfulness Techniques

With less than 10 minutes per day, you can implement DMind into your daily life. The fact that there’s no need for special equipment or a specific type of space means that it’s accessible to all, at virtually any time, in any setting.

There are three main components to the practice of DMind, which the Niroga Institute refers to as ABC’s:

Act: Partake in mindful movement to mitigate and manage stress and trauma
Breathe: Utilize breathing techniques to enhance emotional regulation and wind down
Center: Become more aware of your body and mind to develop more focus and attention

Teachers can intersperse DMind practices seamlessly throughout the day, at the beginning of a period or school day, to switch gears from one subject or activity to another, right after recess to help everyone wind down, and more. These little moments of practice serve as a reset button on classroom climate, for students and teachers alike.

Ultimately, DMind takes a holistic and equitable approach to health and well-being, regardless of our age or physical abilities. It recognizes our near-constant need to access skills for dealing with trauma, stress, and anxiety. Empowering students (and all those around them) with these skills creates more resilient individuals and more harmonious communities.

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Dynamic Mindfulness Online Self-Paced Training For Teachers, Parents, and Caregivers

Impacts of Dynamic Mindfulness

DMind offers benefits that extend far beyond the classroom, as it helps individuals improve essential life skills and exhibit positive behaviors, even in the face of stress and challenge.

To a large degree, these skills overlap with our Executive Functions (EFs) and entail self-regulation, selective attention, reasoning, and cognitive flexibility. Together, they help us navigate life in a more intelligent, fulfilling, and healthy way.

DMind is neuroscience- and trauma-informed, movement-based approach to mindfulness. According to Professor Adele Diamond in the paper Review of the Evidence on, and Fundamental Questions About, Efforts to Improve Executive Functions, Including Working Memory (2020), movement-based mindfulness practices are “by far the best [approaches] for improving Executive Functions.”

Regardless of one’s age, resources, physical ability, cultural background, the regular practice of DMind can offer a variety of benefits in the realm of EFs and beyond. Some of those documented in published, peer-reviewed research using data from Niroga’s school programs include:

Enhanced Executive Functions

Improved working memory: The ability to make sense of information that you receive or events that happen over time
Greater cognitive flexibility: The ability to shift gears between tasks, thought processes and situations
Superior inhibitory control: The ability to control your thoughts, emotions, and focus

Better Mental Health & Community Engagement

Healthier responses to emotional distress: Evidenced by measures of successful emotion regulation, positive thinking, and cognitive restructuring in response to stress
More instances of prosocial behavior: Evidenced by voluntary actions intended to benefit others (e.g., by helping, sharing, comforting, cooperating)
Higher levels of functioning in school: Evidenced by reductions on unexcused absences, detentions, and increases in school engagement

School community practicing Dynamic Mindfulness

A Stronger Sense of Self

Dynamic Mindfulness encourages introspection and self-reflection through mindful movement and contemplation. By paying attention to thoughts, feelings, and bodily sensations, children and adults can develop a deeper understanding of themselves, their triggers, and their patterns of behavior. This increased self-awareness fosters greater self-compassion, improves decision-making, and empowers individuals to live more authentically.

Life is full of ups and downs, and the ability to regulate emotions is crucial for well-being. Dynamic Mindfulness provides practical tools for navigating challenging emotions and building resilience. By integrating movement and breath, individuals learn to release tension, calm the nervous system, and develop greater emotional balance. These skills are invaluable in all areas of life, from handling school or workplace pressures to navigating tricky personal relationships. DMind also helps mitigate the effects of primary, secondary, and vicarious trauma, adverse childhood experiences, and toxic stress.

“Mindful movement has been shown to help us with the functions that we need in these challenging times. Can we rise to the challenge and shout these findings out so that our whole human family can benefit?”

-Daniel J. Siegel, M.D., Executive Director, Mindsight Institute and Clinical Professor, UCLA School of Medicine

Improved Focus and Attention

In today's fast-paced world, where we’re constantly being saturated with information that can cause stress, maintaining focus and attention can feel like a constant struggle. Dynamic Mindfulness helps the mind to become more present and less reactive to external stimuli and distractions. Through mindful movement and breathwork, children and adults alike can learn to focus their attention on the present moment, whether it's on a task at school or work, a conversation with a loved one, or a relationship challenge.

“Movement-Based Mindfulness is a key strategy to promote mental health for all students. Practices such as Niroga Institute’s program are beneficial not only to students but can reduce stress and burnout for educators as well.”

-Janet Pozmantier, Consultant and Founding Director of the Center for School Behavioral Health Mental Health America of Greater Houston

How Dynamic Mindfulness Enhances and Supports Social Emotional Learning

Social Emotional Learning (SEL) provides a valuable framework for developing essential life skills. However, integrating these competencies effectively can be challenging. Dynamic Mindfulness offers a powerful and complementary approach that enhances and supports SEL.

There are three major differentiators of DMind relative to alternative SEL approaches; these include the preliminary consideration of stress resilience as a foundation to SEL, a scaffolded approach to building SEL competency, and a greater focus on the involvement of the entire educational ecosystem (from students to educators and school leaders, parents and caregivers, and the community at large).

Better together: Dynamic Mindfulness (DMind) passed CASEL's rigorous criteria for Evidence-Based Practices. Niroga Institute’s DMind helps improve social-emotional skills in student learning (SEL), teaching (SET), and parenting (SEP).

Stress Resilience As A Foundational Competency

At a glance, the DMind model may seem very similar to the CASEL framework (shown side by side below).

Self-awareness in the DMind Model maps to self-awareness and self-management on the CASEL wheel; DMind’s emotion regulation quadrant overlaps significantly with CASEL’s consideration of responsible decision-making; and DMind’s healthy relationships component encompasses CASEL’s relationship skills and social awareness.

However, the two frameworks differ in one crucial respect: DMind factors in stress resilience as a foundational skill necessary for building the other three competencies. In today’s world of pervasive stressors, stress resilience is necessary for healthy functioning even at a basic level. It is its own component of the model, not just a benefit enjoyed by the development of the other three components.

By actively approaching stress resilience as a skill, students will not only be able to navigate life’s challenges with more ease but gain a foundation for building greater self-awareness, better emotion regulation, and healthier relationships.

A Scaffolded Approach

Another area where DMind extends beyond basic SEL is that it provides a more structured, scaffolded approach. The CASEL Wheel presents competencies as separate and equally accessible, while DMind emphasizes a developmental progression.

The DMind model takes stress resilience as the starting point of the model, which acknowledges the inherently stressful nature of the world we navigate as students, educators, caregivers, and community members.

External factors in our environments can’t simply be turned off or tuned out; we must have the tools to cope with difficult circumstances effectively. For this reason, it’s pivotal to acknowledge the stressors in our daily lives and then work to improve our responses to them.

With stress resilience as a foundation, DMind practitioners can then move toward self-awareness and emotional regulation, which are deeply intertwined with how we process stress, anxiety, burnout, and trauma. DMind practice helps us to identify patterns in our emotions and behaviors as a starting point for self-regulation and mindful navigation of the world around us.

With the intertwined skills of self-awareness and emotion regulation, we are able to respond (rather than react) to interpersonal situations we may find challenging. Self-awareness and the ability to step “outside” our conditioned attitudes about and behavior toward others helps us build empathy and connection. In turn, we are able to show up more mindfully in our relationships with a broader perspective and greater consideration for others.

“I tell my students I want to pass them along into sixth grade as a person who's ready to be in sixth grade, as a good community member, a good person on the inside and out, a good family member, and mindfulness has been a good teaching tool for that…”

-Sam Hess, 5th grade teacher at King-Chavez School.

DMind’s scaffolded approach to Social Emotional Learning enhances its implementation, offering structure and clarity on the successive building blocks needed to develop effective, lasting impact. Think of it through the lens of learning a new language: Doesn’t it make sense to learn the alphabet and basic grammatical concepts before asking students to write sentences with the vocabulary they’re learning?

Involvement of the Entire Educational Ecosystem

One additional difference between the DMind model and CASEL’s historical approach is that since its inception, Niroga Institute has considered the entire educational ecosystem – students, educators, parents, and communities – as enfranchised within its approach. In other words, the DMind model recognizes the need for Social Emotional Learning and development for all stakeholders.

A more recent version of the CASEL Wheel is indeed surrounded by the concentric circles of classrooms, schools, parents and caregivers, and communities. And, it’s only relatively recently that frameworks for Social Emotional Teaching (SET) and Social Emotional Parenting (SEP) have been introduced into SEL approaches.

Teacher engaging in DMind practices in Oakland, California

From the beginning, DMind was designed to address all stakeholders. Niroga acknowledges that environmental stressors, interpersonal challenges, and day-to-day responsibilities naturally differ based on one’s age, circumstances, and vocation. However, DMind was developed to be universal enough to be of value to all stakeholders – including but not limited to students as well as teachers, counselors, social workers, educational administrators, parents, caregivers, and other community leaders.

The touchpoints may be different, but the practice is beneficial regardless of one’s role in the educational ecosystem. For example:

A teacher might use the InPower App for an energizing personal practice in the morning, then play a short DMind video in the classroom to mentally prepare students before a test.
Counselors might hang DMind posters in their offices to inspire students, but also glance up at them and do a short practice after a particularly tough student session.
Principals might lead a short “mindful moments” over the PA at the beginning of the school day, helping set the tone for not just students but everyone on campus.
Parents might access the InPower App for a grounding, centering practice in hopes of shifting their children out of emotional dysregulation and, later the same day, open it for a calming practice before a tenuous work meeting.

The DMind approach is consistent across all stakeholders, but the specific practices and the touchpoints selected can be chosen for situational relevance. DMind can empower virtually anyone at any moment, any time.

Creating a more emotionally intelligent world requires a collaborative effort, and Dynamic Mindfulness offers practical tools and strategies for everyone to participate.

Dynamic Mindfulness and SEL: Creating Better Learning Environments and Communities

When Dynamic Mindfulness is harnessed toward SEL goals, the impact has been documented not only in academic research, but in the experiences of Niroga’s school partners over the past 20 years.

When DMind is well-integrated into the school community, the result is more supportive environments not only for students, but for the people who guide and support them through their most critical developmental phases.

By nurturing essential life skills of stress resilience, self-awareness, emotional regulation, healthy relationship building, DMind facilitates the empowerment of individuals of all ages while laying the foundation for stronger and more compassionate communities.

Dynamic Mindfulness provides the necessary tools to teach core SEL competencies and integrate them into everyday situations. Social Emotional Learning isn’t exclusive to classrooms and children. We should all make the commitment to cultivate these skills. By incorporating even modest doses of mindful movement, breath, and awareness into our daily routines, we can cultivate greater well-being, both individually and collectively.