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As mindfulness practices become more integrated into the classroom and even in our daily lives, technology helps to drive the creation and support of mindfulness applications. Many technological resources are being created and you may notice that a similar thread runs through many; gamification. Gamification supports intrinsic motivation and that application is beneficial to mindfulness technology1. The integration of gamification within the delivery of mindfulness may help shape modern practice in not only education but also the corporate world and people's home lives due to the motivation gamification provides, resulting in the continued development and use of mindfulness skills. In this resource guide, you will find apps, sites, and tools to help with your integration of mindfulness practices in the classroom.
One way that gamification is supportive to ensure continued motivation is based on what Mark Rober likes to call the Super Mario Effect.
Mindfulness App's
Mindfulness App's
Calm: A meditation and sleep app that contains serene narrations, music, animated breathing bubbles, and sleep stories. It tracks progress such as time meditation and longest streaks to support progress motivation. The supporting website has a free Educator section providing "30 Days of Mindfulness in the Classroom" that contains complimentary content for each lesson in the guide and a "Self Care Guide for Educators".
Cost: Free, Paid for Most content Grades: K-12
Platforms: Android, iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch
Mindful Powers: This App is designed for students to take care of a Flibbertigibbet, a virtual creature that needs nurturing from students to help it learn to self-calm and focus. After assisting the creature, it will start to purr (shaking the tablet when on vibrate) and unlock the options to participate in Mindful Play, interactive voice-guided lessons on mindfulness that are unlocked sequentially, or Focus Time, a self-timed activity where students are not able to use the tablet until the time is complete since they are supposed to be focusing on a specific task and will receive a prompt if they touch the app during this time. Activities may be designed for solo exploration or as a class. A motivational reward for students may be designed by treating the Flibbertigibbet like a class pet that students may earn chances to nurture by completing curriculum or self-set goals.
Cost: Free Grades: K-5 Platforms: iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch
Smiling Mind: This Australian app provides sequential steps to meditation for the individual with calming exercises and visualizations. It also has meditations and resources for young adults handling school stress. The website has additional resources including a subscription to a classroom curriculum designed around Australian standards and informed by research and youth psychologists. The app tracks progress per each individual with an account so if wishing to scaffold for each student you will need parental assistance. Otherwise, educators can use the app practices for the class with a personal account without tracking.
Cost: Free App, Curriculum Fee Grades: 1-12 Platforms: Android, iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch
myPeekaville is an interactive SEL digital game designed to helps foster motivation. Some of the threads focus on mindfulness aspects. It ties into Peekapak a curriculum site which offers complete teaching units for SEL, including mindfulness lessons.
Cost: Free, Paid Grades: Pre-k-5 Platforms: Android, iPhone
Calm Kids: A mindfulness and yoga app that allows simultaneous logins from multiple devices and provides over 100 content cards that feature interactive characters. It provides mindfulness practices for children, including guided meditations, mindfulness exercises, and calming music. As with many mindfulness apps, it provides activities to promote sleep and help children focus. The content and exercises are supported in both English and Vietnamese languages. Some additional features include timers, an emotion diary, and exercise suggestions to improve a child's mood using AI.
Cost: Free, Paid Grades: Pre-k-12 Platforms: Android, iPhone
Headspace: This is a very popular meditation and sleep app. Once the meditation is completed a quote about the meditation may be shared on social media. The skills used are also provided for each meditation. An Education Guide is available for use with ages 11+ and assists in methods to integrate the app's content into a classroom environment and includes printable certificates to celebrate the completion of a topic. It also uses the endowed progress effect to ensure continued interest by celebrating early success and showcasing progress towards a goal.
Cost: Free, Free to try Grades: 3-12 Platforms: Android, iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch
SoundMind: After creating an avatar, users of this app can create soundscapes that match the mood, mood-based binaural beats, affirmations, journaling, wellness talks, and sound-driven brain booster games. This app is grounded in musical therapy and combines audio and visuals to assist in tracking and improving mood. The SoundMind school integration option provides additional data support for educators to track and review classroom moods and involvement. Some students may be eligible for a free membership and tablet through TruConnect.
Cost: Free, Paid Grades: K-12 Platforms: iPhone, iPod Touch
Websites
Websites
GoNoodle is a website providing short activities that work to get students to participate in thoughtful movement and mindfulness exercises such as breathing, focus, and body awareness. The thought behind it is that Desk-side movement helps kids achieve more by keeping them engaged and motivated throughout the day. Students choose a class avatar known as a class chooses a Champ who grows as the class earns the points needed to advance to the next level. This helps create long-term engagement as the class is rewarded for engagement by helping them grow their Champ. Sign-up as an Educator for extracurricular resources. Educators or parents may also sign-up via the main site to create accounts for individual students and classes if wanting access to the video content and avatar without access to the additional curriculum resources and guides. Click here for more info about GoNoodle.
Cost: Free Grades: K-7
ZENworks: ZENworks Yoga is a Cleveland-based 501(c)(3) non-profit organization committed to supporting the mental and physical wellness of students, staff, and families in underserved schools and community organizations through mindfulness and yoga programming.
This resource site contains several printouts and videos for classroom use as well as instructions for utilization, blog entries including how to Create a Mindful Corner, and professional development (paid service). In the ZENworks videos section, you will find full-length classes, a Reset mindfulness series, and Brain Breaks which uses a mood chart for the site to suggest yoga videos and affirmations that will best fit the chosen mood. These videos can be brought up and used based on their sample schedule in the Resources section. There are also instructions to make a glitter jar, a craft often used in tangent with mindfulness exercises.
Cost: Free, paid Grades: Pre-k-12
QuaverReady: This educational site is designed for SEL and Mindfulness via a fully digital platform. The curriculum guide breaks down where mindfulness occurs (self skills) from their 36 ready-to-use lessons and contains a variety of interactive screens, songs, and activities to engage students. There are also 10-minute or fewer Brain Breaks, and Interventions such as Peace Corner resources. Higher-end options from a school-wide license allow for tracking of completion and instructional design data. Animations are available in English and Spanish.
Cost: Free to Try, Paid Grades: Pre-K-6
Class Dojo: Contains short lessons to assist students with focusing and other mindfulness skills. These were created in partnership with Yale University's Center for Emotional Intelligence and there are additional lessons leading students on a journey to handling overwhelming emotions.
Curriculum Tools and Games
Curriculum Tools and Games
Brain HQ: Attention Exercise Games
Google Slides and Canva for Choice Boards: These are a great way to gamify mindfulness by providing students choices in how they will participate for the day. You can also add points to each option so that students can "level up" individually or as a class. Here is an example designed in Canva and uploaded to Google Slides
Another approach to choice and integration of mindfulness and gamification is a Brain Booth like the one at Cal Poly Humboldt2 or Georgia Southern University. These incorporate activities that are both tangible like puzzles and also include new technologies such as Biofeedback Stations, Light Therapy, and Virtual Reality. Giving students choice in their mindful activities with a space designed to support variety can be incorporated into the K-12 classroom as well such as the example of a Mindful Corner from ZenWorks.
Mindfulness Scavenger Hunts: Use these or create your own for a fun independent or class activity.
Google Arts & Culture: Virtual coloring books, puzzles, music games, and more options that pair well with focus timers and peace/calm/mindfulness activity corners.
Mindfulness Bingo: Customizable Mindfulness Bingo Card generator free downloadable physical mindfulness games such as Tiny God.
Flippity.net: Several customizable digital tools such as spinners which educators can place mindfulness activities instead for those who may be overwhelmed by choice and a Badge Tracker allowing gamification application for mindfulness achievements.
Additional ways to incorporate mindfulness and gamification using technology are in this Google Sites example. The Self Management Module ties into many mindfulness skills. Here the creator uses the site as a Learning Management system with peripherals such as bitmoji for Avatar creation and a PDF for tracking of experience (like a role-playing Game sheet). A site called Classcraft also incorporates these gamification elements in its learning management system. Much of the core content needs to be designed, however, its support structure can help to motivate and may be worth exploring like this educator. Since Classcraft utilizes gamification principles and incorporates them in the gaming culture, it has shown success for PBIS participation, which mindfulness practices can be used within the PBIS frameworks implementation Tiers such as at the Milwaukee Public Schools.
Youtube Videos
Youtube Videos
Many free videos for educators regarding mindfulness can be incorporated into lesson planning as a group or individual activities using technology mediums such as whiteboards, tablets, or choice boards. Some are from apps or sites listed above that use video channels to provide some of their content without needing an account.
Headspace Videos: Includes "Find Your Force With Star Wars" comprising of 4 short animated videos telling a story that include interactive lessons, "Sesame Street x Headspace Monster Meditations" consisting of 6 animated shorts with Sesame Street characters to guide students through interactive mindfulness activities, 13 "Mini Mindfulness" video activities, along with videos specifically created for educators about integrating mindfulness and headspace into the classroom, music, videos to help with sleep, the science behind mindfulness, and more with 53o+ videos to use in practice or for further learning. Most videos are in the English language, however, there is also a number in Spanish, French, German, and Portuguese.
GoNoodle Videos: Send home links to some of the videos from GoNoodle for families to join in on the activities or use these featured videos without signing up for a GoNoodle account. Videos are primarily in the English language with some in Spanish. The glitter jar video is a digital adaption if not wishing to create a physical one for each student or can be used in tangent with the physical item.
NamasteInSchool: Several breathing exercise videos
The Mindfulness Teacher: Videos created for children and also informational videos for educators. There are calming classroom timers such as this Waves video, mindfulness exercises, and read-aloud animated story books.
Additional Resources
Additional Resources
Common Sense Education: Curated mindfulness educational technology list along with reviews.
How to Use Technology in your Classroom to Promote Mindfulness
Johnson, Daniel, Hides, Leanne, Kavanagh, David, Zelenko, Oksana, Stoyanov, Stoyan, Cockshaw, Wendell, Staneva, Aleksandra, & Wilson, Hollie (2016) Smiling Mind – Game on: A gamified mindfulness meditation program for young people. Young and Well Cooperative Research Centre, Australia.
Karadjova, K.G. (2018). Mindfulness and gamification in the higher education classroom: Friends or foes? Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Higher Education Advances (HEAd'18).
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