In my teens, I came to know the struggles with mental health all too well. That is why we are making MindUP for Life available online for any parent or teacher who wants their children to be equipped with the right tools to manage stress and regulate emotions. "We have a full-blown national emergency on our hands, and unless we make mental fitness a priority, our children will continue to suffer. ![]() "Whether it's social media, peer pressure or the isolation of the COVID-19 pandemic, children of this generation are facing the toughest mental health challenges in human history," stated MindUP Founder and CEO Goldie Hawn. The MindUP program is now accessible online to parents, teachers and kids across the globe. It was developed with the help of the field's top educators and neuroscientists to equip children with the knowledge and tools to manage stress, regulate emotions and to face the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic and 21st century with optimism, resilience, and compassion. Editor’s note: The following is a critique of a social and emotional learning program called MindUP that I have covered in other blogs (see list below) and in a feature in Scientific American Mind (visit “ Schools Add Workouts for Attention, Grit and Emotional Control”).MindUP for Life, the signature program of the Goldie Hawn Foundation, announced today the launch of MindUP for Life Digital - an interactive online learning platform bringing MindUP's evidence-based mental fitness program to children, families, educators, senior-leaders, and adults nationwide. Please also read a response to this critique, posted separately, from MindUP’s Rebecca Calos. I hope this debate provides food for thought about how to best encourage healthy social and emotional development in our children. ![]() “Self-regulation” is the latest buzz word in education, and the MindUP curriculum for schools, conceived by actor Goldie Hawn, capitalizes on it. MindUP is marketed to teachers as a means of helping children to develop self-regulation, which is another way of saying “self-control.” The program’s “core practice” involves teaching children focused breathing techniques while they also practice non-judgmental awareness of their thoughts, which is supposed to help them calm down and be less anxious. Hawn’s curriculum is also supposed to make children feel happier and more optimistic. This is all purported to help them to be better able to learn. The truth is that MindUP can interfere with a child’s innate self-regulator, the conscience, impeding his moral development and thus his ability to learn. Rather than help him develop self-control, it trains him to manipulate his mind and manipulate others to get pleasurable feelings for himself. The “core practice” taught in MindUP is akin to certain forms of Buddhist-style mindfulness meditation including Anapanasati and Samadhi. In MindUP, the teacher strikes a Zenergy chime, and students are generally asked to sit cross legged, palms up and eyes closed. ![]() ![]() They are to direct their attention to the sound of the chime and focus intently on their breathing. The chime can gradually evoke a conditioned response in the children, as similar tools do in Buddhist monks. Teachers are encouraged to use this core practice several times a day. Mindfulness meditation such as this can be a way of bringing the mind into an altered state of consciousness. Many people who practice meditation have encountered unexpected negative side effects such as a sensation of being disconnected from one’s body or from reality, among other frightening reactions. Teachers of MindUP are exposing children to these potential dangers.
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