Stillness in Preschool and School

By Anna Bornstein

This is a hands-on report on how to find calm in the most stressed out and turbulent of worlds today – preschools and schools. Not a calm out there, but the calm inside all of us, closer than our thoughts and as natural as the air we breathe.
25 years of experience with the Dream of the Good in preschools and schools in all parts of Sweden show very good results. The grown-ups did not believe the kids would take to it.
But the message is, it can be done, and kids of all ages like it – if the practices are simple and natural. Their teachers often didn’t think it was possible, but once they learn they also benefit. Research confirms the positive results: less stress, less psychological problems and better self-image.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Release date: Jan 31, 2022
• ISBN: 9781398421929

Anna Bornstein

Anna Bornstein is a Swedish journalist and writer with a lifelong experience of reporting on existential topics. Her interest in nonviolence brought her as a lecturer to schools in the mid-80s. She saw the bullying and stress and began weaving in simple mindfulness and stillness times in the curriculums. The non-profit Dream of the Good was born. In this book, she shares the treasures of calm unearthed by its team during 25 years of working with teachers, children and students in preschools and schools.

Book preview

About the Author

Anna Bornstein is a Swedish journalist and writer with a lifelong experience of reporting on existential topics. Her interest in nonviolence brought her as a lecturer to schools in the mid-80s. She saw the bullying and stress and began weaving in simple mindfulness and stillness times in the curriculums. The non-profit Dream of the Good was born. In this book, she shares the treasures of calm unearthed by its team during 25 years of working with teachers, children and students in preschools and schools.

Dedication

Thank you to the Dalai Lama, who met with the high school students of Stockholm and taught them non-violence in the city’s Globe Arena in 1996 and inspired the Dream of the Good.

Thank you to Herbert Benson, the founder of the Benson Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine who pioneered research with relaxation and stillness in American intercity schools in the 90s. The results gave us courage and incentive.

Copyright Information ©

Anna Bornstein 2022

The right of Anna Bornstein to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by the author in accordance with section 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.

Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

ISBN 9781398421912 (Paperback)

ISBN 9781398421929 (ePub e-book)

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First Published 2022

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Acknowledgement

Thank you to all the principals, teachers and school health professionals who cooperated in the schools.

And to all the colleagues and friends in the Dream of the Good, the non-profit organisation who kept up the work year after year.

Preface

All people, all over the world, share the same dream. We dream of security, peace, health and development for ourselves, children and grandchildren—our own and others’. All that, in the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Swedish School Act, is called the best interests of the child. Out of that dream much good comes. But it also causes us pain when reality strays too far from it.

Now is such a time in Sweden. One in five children in school, ten to seventeen years old, is mentally ill. If you are a teacher, you will see the development up close and be weighed down by the fact that the students are not feeling well, and that the conditions for learning are deteriorating. Too many children and students are stressed, depressed, anxious and restless. Bullying at school is increasing despite the fact that the National Agency of Education clearly requires zero tolerance. The mental ill health among children and young people is one of our biggest public health problems. The situation is so serious that preschool and school cannot cope with the problems without the help of healthcare and social services. The School Act and the preschool and school steering documents emphasise the importance of a calm and safe environment. According to the Children Convention, which became a law in Sweden this year (2020), every child has the right to rest and good health (Article 24).

This book shows how, by simple means and without great expense, we can reach that goal. It speaks of twenty-five years’ experience of weaving in short times of relaxation and rest in preschools, elementary schools and high schools in all parts of Sweden. In it, you will meet teachers and pioneers who have opened new paths. We will see how the assignment can be realised. The supportive research and classroom experience with stillness practice for children and students on all levels of school is documented. We tell not only about good fruits but also about the obstacles and how they can be tackled. About the importance of knowing and understanding the difficulties, of believing in the good possibilities.

How do children and students react to stillness? Can they find their own calm in an environment that is ranked among the most stressed by the Swedish Work Environment Authority? Does stillness and relaxation prevent ill health? Do the children and students become peaceful?

Stillness is easier than you think—effortless, well-liked and effective. Stillness gives us a chance to mobilise our interior. Short times of relaxation and quiet improve the conditions for learning, relating and physical and mental health. Taking a little pause to relax costs nothing and can easily be woven into the daily routines. Stillness prevents many of the problems that every educator and teacher today is facing.

A big thanks to Ann-Kristin Källström-Sundgren, head of the two municipal preschools, Armbandet and Kättsätter, in Norrköping, and her dedicated staff. Through our collaboration and Ann-Kristin’s leadership and courageous pioneering efforts during twenty-five years with stillness for the youngest, the story of the pre-schooler in the book has become very vibrant and earthy. Norrköping is today a pilot municipality for the Dream of the Good NGO, and short stillness times are woven into the daily work in many of its schools and preschools.

This book is not written to stay on the bookshelf or desk. We hope to bring it to you as a tune, which you spontaneously start humming. The preschool children’s experiences with stillness are a theme winding through the book, which helps us hear all the other tunes—about the work with older students—better. Thank you also to the many teacher pioneers from elementary and high school who shared their experiences and allowed themselves to be interviewed. And thank you to all the employees of the non-profit organisation, Dream of the Good, that contributed with their stories and thoughts. They have been and still are the hub of the great work.

Safety and Study

Every child has the right to play, rest and leisure—CRC, Article 31

The education must be designed in such a way that all students are assured of a school environment characterised by security and study.

The preschool should stimulate children’s development and learning and offer the children a secure care. The Swedish School Act, end of box.

The Problematic Reality

The noise in preschool today is approaching the higher limits allowed for heavy industry in Sweden. In Stockholm and Malmö, less than half of the students in 8th grade this year (2017) say that they have peace for studying. In Malmö, twelve- and fourteen-year-olds report that they never, rarely or just once in a long while have work peace. All according to a survey conducted in 2012 by the Daily News in all municipal schools in Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmö. In the School Inspectorate’s supervision of 932 elementary and high schools in 2016, 32% of the high schools and 40% of the elementary schools failed to comply with the School Act’s requirements regarding a safe and quiet study environment. If the schools cannot remedy the situation, their municipalities will be fined.

Schools need to quickly rectify their situation. All students have the right to feel safe in school and to enjoy a quiet study environment, stated Helén Änmo, the School Inspectorate’s director general.

Work peace in the class and safety in the break and on the web are crucial for the students’ learning and self-esteem, stated Gustaf Fridolin, then education minister.

Dagens Nyheter 2016-08-16

Noise and Chaos

At Rönnby preschool in Västerås, the teacher, Lillemor Stålbom, who has long experience with stillness methods, introduced quiet breakfast in her children’s group. Can we be so quiet that we hear the birds outside the window? Very, very quiet? Lillemor asked.

How then can we reach the milk package on the other side of the table? asked a little boy.

We can point! his friend said.

How do we know what it means? another child wondered.

We look each other in the eyes! came his friend’s prompt reply.

There was contact-making without words, natural to help each other and wonderfully quiet, Lillemor recalls. When we forgot to have a quiet breakfast, there was always a child who reminded us, ‘I want to have quiet breakfast today!’ Everyone respected the friend’s wish and readily fell into our breakfast calm. When we mentioned it at the parent meeting, a parent said with a smile: ‘Yes, it is, of course, good, but at home on Saturday mornings, we are no longer allowed to listen to the radio.’

The place where we leave our children and grandchildren while we perform our tasks in society should be quiet and safe. Surely! But nobody expects the preschool to live up to that anymore. The noise in preschool, with peaks of shrill screams and loud ramblings, has been screwed up to the upper limits in heavy industry. Official reports from the Work Environment Bureau, the Public Health Institute and other authorities show a scary picture, as if reality has been trolled. The stress of preschool teachers is so severe that no matter how great efforts are made to help their work situation, it is never enough. The greater the commitment, the more severe the stress seems to be. The preschool staff experience the effects of stress long after the workday is over and many still feel it the next morning when they come back to work. Besides the dragging on, fatigue makes many feel irritable and tense, get headaches and concentration problems. The consequences of this will be ill health, the educational work suffers and long-term sick leave will increase. Preschool staff are affected, in a greater degree than people in other professions, by fatigue and sleeplessness. Stress and heavy workloads are the main causes of work-related health problems for teachers.

In a large research study with seventeen preschools in Umeå, noise levels of over 70 decibels were registered during the working day. Scientist have investigated different ways to reduce the sound level. They have tried various changes in the physical environment, such as sound-dampening tables and floors where the children eat and play, to change the lighting and invest in silent toys. But the children cannot be soundproof. They have also experimented with fewer children in the groups and tried to educate children to become more aware of noise. But small children are not easily silenced just by reprimands. All parents and everybody who works with small children know this.

The researchers have a clear understanding of the harmful effects of the noise on preschool teachers and personnel. But there is no coherent scientific picture of what happens to children who are exposed to loud noise throughout the days. Many children complain that they feel the shrill sounds in their stomach and that the loud noise makes their heart beat faster and their head spin. Young children are much more sensitive and open than adults. Cortisol measurements indicate that the child reacts to high noise levels with extreme stress. It is likely that the noise has much more devastating effects in small children than in adults. Researchers and preschool educators have been able to observe various negative effects in children, such as hearing and voice difficulties, learning problems, difficulties in perceiving speech, as well as in concentration and sleep.¹

The percentage of students who feel they get disturbed by other students on almost every lesson doubled between 2006 and 2012, according to a survey by the Teachers Union. Research with elementary school children shows in a series of tests that the children after prolonged exposure to noise perform worse in reading comprehension and in laying puzzle. Their motivation has also been reduced. Negative effects on reading ability and memory have also been observed in several studies, in addition to impaired learning. Noise can also affect the ability to concentrate so that the task will be more difficult and the work performance lessened.

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¹ Source: Bullret bort. (Get rid of the noise!) A small book about good sound environment in preschool, Public Health Authority and other. (2010)↩︎

Stillness: A Natural Resource

I kept postponing introducing the stillness practices in my children’s group, says one of the newly graduated teachers at the Preschool Armbandet in Norrköping. I didn’t think that it would work. Finally, one beautiful autumn day, I brought a group of children, two to three years old, up into the forest. We stood in a circle and held each other’s hands. ‘Let’s be quiet and listen to all the sounds,’ I instructed them. We took a few deep breaths, felt the scents in the air and listened. The children were silent, deeply concentrating and listening for so long that I ended up worrying that they got cold, so I broke the silence.

Afterwards they told each other what they had heard. One child had heard a motor far away, another, a birdsong. A little girl had listened to the wind blowing through the tree’s crown. Her friend, a boy of two and a half years, was silent for a long time when it was his turn to tell. ‘I heard the wings of a butterfly when it flew by,’ he said.

In Norrskedika village on the coast north of Stockholm, where I live, there was an iron mine during the latter part of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. It was a quarry where the ore was extracted from deep below the surface of the village meadow. People had to exert effort and dig to discover and access it. But iron was of great use for the developing industrialism in Sweden. Today, one and a half centuries later, society is in a different phase of development. Now we need to take advantage of a more subtle natural resource—stillness. There is stillness out there in nature, behind the whisper of the winds and the song of the birds, but also even closer, inside of us. Like the iron ore, it is not visible on the surface. But if you find it, it will be of great benefit to ourselves and to society at large. Stillness requires a different handling than iron ore. It is easier, but maybe also more difficult, to extract. And it calls for other kinds of tools than skewers and picks—determination and will, understanding, patience and especially trust, trust that our efforts will bear fruit. Stillness can give us what we need most today—better physical and mental health, reduced stress, reflection and perspective, improved self-image, a better work and learning environment and reduced medical cost. Extracting stillness is not as physically demanding as mining iron ore. But when we search for peace and stillness within ourselves, we may happen upon other subtler obstacles and resistances, such as the extrovert lifestyle that leads us to believe that the help we need will come from the outside. But even restlessness, stress and worry can put obstacles in the way.

There are special techniques and knowledge for stillness management. The resources are closer to the surface than we might think, especially in children and adolescents. It is important to recognise its great value and to make room for it.

The Dream of the Good Project

As a journalist and writer, I learnt early to appreciate stillness. It is the prerequisite for the creativity and deep reflection needed in writing. Through my books and articles on existential themes, I was invited to lecture in Swedish high schools. The stress I observed in the classrooms worried me a lot and made me weave short times of stillness into my lectures. The students were hungry for stillness. This is voluntary, I used to say. Anyone who does not want to join can take a longer break. But hardly anyone ever went out. And when I ended the exercise by clapping my hands, the students stayed quiet and still for so long that I thought they hadn’t heard me. Their teachers were as fallen from the sky. The experience led me and some friends to initiate a major nonviolent project in the 24 municipal high schools in Stockholm 1995-96.

We held seminars that included relaxation and stillness for students and parents. No one could have anticipated the students’ great enthusiasm. We discovered that even the most restless and unruly students have a secret longing for peace and quiet. When the project culminated in May 1996 with the students getting to meet the Dalai Lama in the Globe, we would have been able to fill the large arena many times over with students who wanted to attend. The students were given the opportunity to ask questions to the Dalai Lama about the secret of his peace work, for which he received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989.

When you are calm and relaxed, you can think clearly and use your thinking ability better. Whatever you do, whether you study or work, you can do better, he explained to his young audience, which was so quiet and focussed that you could hear a pin drop. After a year of voluntary full-time work in the school’s turbulent everyday life, I had intended to return to my regular job. But that did not happen; instead, I gathered together a team of energetic and talented friends and experts from various occupations, teachers, psychologists, physiotherapists, a priest, a psychiatrist and some leaders from the business community. We saw a possibility that the school officials and principals were not aware of: to improve the working environment and conditions in school.

This led to the founding of the non-profit organisation, The Dream of the Good. We developed a stillness method that would work not only in a single project but could be woven into the school day more permanently. The name ‘The dream of the good’ refers to the inner human treasure that we all share—our human value. It is nothing new, it was known already in antiquity.

One of the derivations of the word människa, human being in Swedish, is the ancient Swedish word ‘menska’, which means goodness, generosity. Without contact with that resource, we are lost, not only as individuals but also as citizens in a democratic society. Engaged high school and elementary schoolteachers and principals joined our network. The method had already been successfully tested and its special character with the four forms of practice—stillness, touch, reflection and contemplative movement—had been developed. Then the preschool director, Ann-Kristin Källström-Sundgren, joined our project group.

It didn’t take long for her to understand what we were doing. This we have to begin with in preschool, that’s where you do the groundwork, she explained. That far, we had not thought, but Ann-Kristin knew what she was talking about. We developed some simple practices that she tried out in the children’s groups at the preschool, Bracelet, in Norrköping, where she was the new headmaster. The same practices that were appreciated by high school and elementary school students, but in a simplified, shorter version, turned out to work very well for the youngest children in preschool.

Since then, the method of stillness has been spread through the dandelion principle from teacher to teacher at preschools and schools around Sweden. The organisation has trained teachers, collected and reported about experiences, analysed results and lobbied for quiet times to be included in the preschool and school day, just as Per Henrik Ling in the beginning of the 19th century pioneered gymnastics in the Swedish school day.

Initially, the work was largely non-profit, but because of the growing interest and need, we received funding from private individuals and big foundations, which made it possible to build a more stable organisation. In 2015, the Dream of the Good received a large government grant for the high school project, My Calm, which became very successful. After having been tried and followed for three years, the government is offering another three years of funding.

My writing ability came in handy to report and communicate our experiences. The work has also been extensively spread in media during the years through news articles, TV shows and radio programmes.

The Dream of the Good is a non-profit, politically independent, secular organisation whose purpose is to give children, students, teachers and principals an opportunity to find peace and quiet in their own way. The organisation trains teachers and principals and also works directly with children and students to provide them with effective peace and quiet tools to deal with everyday stress. It helps schools meet the requirements of the School Act for a school environment characterised by security and calm for study.

"My grandmothers read aloud to me when I was little. I sat on their knees in front of the fireplace. It was moments of calm and stillness with total presence and I remember how inner images of the stories they shared formed in my imagination. I could sit for hours afterwards and draw what I had heard. Attendance and concentration were great. My self-esteem, my courage to express myself and the understanding of what I heard developed within me. Today, we live in a world full of impressions and we are often in a hurry. The stress is high, we need to help our children, young people and ourselves find an inner peace for our health, learning and development. When I came to a preschool in 1996 with a lot of stress, where children and educators had high sick leave, I realised that something had to be done. I understood that we, as adults, must be role models for the growing generation. The Dream of the Good method is well tested and based on research. Its purpose is supported by all preschool and school steering documents and also by the Convention of the Rights of the Child. The method, with its four simple forms of stillness, helps us—who are active in preschools and schools create the very best conditions for the health, learning and development of children and students."

-Ann-Kristin Källström-Sundgren, preschool director in Norrköping

Ann-Kristin Källström-Sundgren has worked for more than forty years in preschools, almost thirty of them as preschool director. She has sought and received EU funding ten times to develop the preschool activities, share and inspire on a wider context. Today, the two big preschools that she leads, Bracelet and Kättsätter, have partners in many European countries. In 2010-2, Ann-Kristin was one of the leaders in the municipality of Norrköping’s work with the implementation of the new curriculum in the preschool. In the Bracelet and Kättsätter, they have used the Dream of the Good method since 1996.

The Preschool: A Success Story

The mother of a two-and-a-half-year-old girl in the Bracelet is very stressed and irritated when she throws on her coat to leave for preschool in the morning. The daughter calmly waits by the door. Mom, stop, breathe! she says in a calm voice.

The preschool, Bracelet, is located in a suburban area in Norrköping. The area was built in the 1960s and has many of the problems that weigh on other similar areas in Norrköping including very high sick leave. In that reality, Ann-Kristin raised the banner of the Dream of the Good. Are you ready to work with blood, sweat and tears? she asked her new colleagues when she came on as the new manager.

Yes, they replied.

With the support of the municipal management, EU funds were sought and granted for the Bracelet. The preschool was the first public activity in Sweden to be granted such funds. In this way, Ann-Kristin could afford to educate her employees in the stillness method. As a result, short times of stillness were introduced in all the children’s groups, first at the Bracelet and also at the preschool Kättsätter in the same area, in