The beginning of a new school year brings a mix of fresh energy and familiar challenges. New students, new routines, and new expectations all arrive at once. Often alongside big emotions, wobbly self-regulation, and a need to rebuild a sense of safety and belonging.
Pause Breathe Smile can support you to start the school year on the right foot.
As a free, Aotearoa-based mindfulness programme designed specifically for schools, Pause Breathe Smile offers a shared language, practices and skill development that help both teachers and students learn how to pause, notice, and respond with greater awareness and kindness.
What mindfulness looks like in Pause Breathe Smile
Mindfulness isn’t about trying to get tamariki to always be quiet or perfectly focused.
Instead, the Pause Breathe Smile approach supports calmer classrooms by helping ākonga to:
- notice what’s happening in their bodies, thoughts, and emotions
- practise simple strategies to help them regulate and refocus
- grow qualities of curiosity, kindness, gratitude, and resilience
Why the start of the year matters
The first weeks of school help establish your classroom culture. When Pause Breathe Smile is introduced early, it sends a clear message:
This is a place where we pause, we breathe, and we learn how to respond thoughtfully.
Beginning the year with shared mind-health skill development such as mindful breathing, noticing sensations, or naming emotions can help:
- support smoother transitions between lessons and activities
- reduce overwhelm and reactivity
- create a sense of consistency and safety
- normalise talking about feelings and self-regulation.
If you’ve already received training in Pause Breathe Smile, you’ll be able to recognise which activities or practices best meet the needs of your class or individual learners at the right moment, helping to foster a calmer classroom environment.
Start small, build gently
One of the strengths of Pause Breathe Smile is that it fits into the school day without needing loads of extra time or special equipment.
Even before pulling out the first Pause Breathe Smile lesson, called “Coming Home,” you can:
- Try a short breathing practice – visit the Member Resources Pātaka or the Pause Breathe Smile app and use one of the dozens of practices there.
- Do a mindful movement before or after breaks – the Mindful Movement videos on the Member Resources Pātaka are designed to be played in the classroom for students to follow along with.
- Start introducing Pause Breathe Smile language like “dropping anchor”, “name it to tame it,” and “thoughts are just thoughts, not facts”.
- Gear up to start the Pause Breathe Smile lessons with just a few brief practices throughout the week.
These small, consistent moments build student’s familiarity and confidence utilising mind-health skills and help you feel supported rather than stretched.
A shared language for the year ahead
As the year unfolds, Pause Breathe Smile provides a common framework that can be returned to again and again: during busy terms, tricky conversations, or moments when everyone needs to reset.
Over time, the skills developed through these small practices help create calmer classrooms where students feel supported to learn, manage emotions, and care for themselves and one another. And a classroom where teachers are equipped to give everyone the best chance of a great school year ahead.