Mentoring through EduSpirit:
A humanizing practice of coming together, sharing expertise, and learning alongside one another.
& Consultation Services:
Talking together about mind-body-spirit connections in education in a trusting and caring space.
What is mentoring through EduSpirit?
Mentoring through EduSpirit is both an inward exploration and an outward process that will assist you in developing critical consciousness, an awareness of your agency within socially-constructed environments such as schools. It is based on your needs, preferences, and contexts. At this time, mentoring sessions are one-on-one with Cristina and center around topics related to your personal and professional growth that will help you to expand your mind-body-spirit connection within your teaching whether at home or in the classroom. Cristina uses the critical consciousness continuum in the mentoring sessions to guide discussion.
Who can benefit?
Educators, particularly preK - 12 teachers or higher education instructors, who are interested in bringing their full selves into their teaching can benefit greatly. Those who want to integrate mind-body-spirit awareness into their learning and teaching will best be served by EduSpirit’s platform, resources, and discussions.
What to Expect
Every person is different so each mentoring session will be unique. However, here is an example of a possible mentoring scenario:
An elementary school teacher is struggling to find a healthy balance between home and work. She feels overwhelmed because she doesn’t feel like she is able to be present for her family at home and, at school, she is struggling to teach students who don’t seem engaged or are consistently distracted. She is exhausted and, because of the stress, finds herself not taking care of her health. She knows she needs for things to change, but isn’t sure where to start. There’s just so much going on all at once! She dreams of being on a beach, taking in the warm sun, and looking out at the ocean without any demands on her. She asks, “What do I need to do? Where do I begin? How do I get back in control of my life?”
We begin the session by taking stock of each concern she has knowing that where we want her to arrive is at mind-body-spirit alignment, where her internal knowings of herself match up with her thoughts, words, and actions. We use the critical consciousness continuum to guide our discussion. For example, she may say that what will reduce her stress the most is having her students listen to her when she is teaching a lesson or giving instructions. So, where we may start on the continuum is with the Internal Learning principle, “Exploring Different Roads.” Exploring different roads may mean talking through mindsets that create stress and replacing them with affirmative statements and actions. By working on changing a negative mindset that sounds like, “I don’t have the patience to handle these students”, she instead begins to acknowledge all the ways she experiences patience as both the giver and receiver in her life. This understanding reveals her capacity to hold space for other people, including her students and changes the way she thinks about them as learners in her classroom.
