TAKING YOUR SEAT

Essential Question: Why am I here? What do I want to learn?

As a new school year begins, students and teachers come together to “take our seats”—both literally, in our classrooms, and more deeply, in ourselves and in relationship with one another. This opening theme invites us to arrive fully, set intentions, and begin the year with awareness and purpose. In the first month of school, we establish rhythms and routines, set goals, and create shared agreements that will guide our interactions and ethical conduct as a learning community. For our youngest students, this is a foundational time to build trust, form respectful friendships, and gently bridge the space between home and school. For older students, it’s a time to take on class caretaking responsibilities and expand the understanding of “sacred space”—from classroom altars to the materials, spaces, and all beings that make up our school environment. Taking our seat is both a practice and a metaphor: an invitation to be present, to belong, and to begin together.

Examples from school for younger children:

• Create personalized cushion tags to sew on zafu cushions for circle times.
• Create classroom agreements.
• Play movement games that emphasize stop and go movement (e.g., “Magic Rock”, “Musical Chairs”, “Freeze Dance”).
• Learn about classroom materials and how they are used and shared.
• Make a class poster of family photos. Have conversations about pets, family members, kinds of homes, and sacred spaces.
• Bake seasonal baked goods together.
• Learn songs like “Sit Like a Buddha” and “Sit With Me” 
• Practice listening meditation to the sound of the fading singing bowl.
• Practice grounding breathing activities like “Breathe like a Bear” (from Kira Willey’s book of the same title)

For older children:

• Go on a Boundary Walk of the school campus.
• Read and talk about the school’s and campus history and our Land Acknowledgement. 
• Create classroom agreements.
• In small groups, invent your own country, complete with language, code of ethics, government, currency, cuisine, music, and sport. Present to the group.
• Journal and draw in the forest.
• Practice walking meditation outdoors.
• Write a school song.

Guiding questions for reflection and conversation:

• What are my boundaries?
• What makes school a place I want to be?
• What are my roles and responsibilities?
• What communities am I aware of or am a part of?
• What is a sangha?
• Who are the people in my school, and what are their roles?
• In what ways do I belong here, and can I help others feel belonging?