Find your creative expression and knowledge with ease
A Unique Approach
For many children and young adults, the dramatic shift to online learning has created both emotional and mental barriers to accessing, understanding, and retaining new concepts in various subject areas. Although an in-person classroom experience is fully available for students again, there remains an underlying tone of stress and anxiety resulting from the massive social changes in our world since the spring of 2020. Through the use of short yet gentle mindfulness and somatic awareness exercises, I help students learn how to connect with their feelings about a specific subject and/or new concept before attending to a lesson. My goal is to help students feel inner calm and peace, grow into confidence, and expand into a real joy for learning.
Image of The Five Practices of Somatic IFS
Center- the Embodied Self
Expanding out in a circular pattern from center in a rainbow arch: TOUCH, MOVEMENT, RESONANCE, BREATH, and AWARENESS
About Somatic Awareness and Mindfulness
What is Somatic Awareness?
Somatic awareness is any purposeful and active attention placed on the mind-body connection. There are a range of practices in which you can engage to help you notice what is happening in your mind and body at the same time. This is meant to help you survey your present internal experiences. You can listen to signals your body sends about areas of pain, discomfort, or imbalance. These practices allow you to access more information about the ways you hold on to your experiences in your body. Somatic experts believe this knowledge, combined with natural movement and touch, can help you work toward healing and wellness.
Somatics: Definition, Exercises, Evidence, and More. (n.d.). Healthline.com. https://www.healthline.com/health/somatics#somatic-therapy
Somatic awareness also involves attending to our external senses — sight, hearing, tasting, smelling and touching — as well as to our proprioception or the sensing of our movements. Proprioception guides our senses in the world and underlies our capacity for orientation.
Definitions. (2017, February 22). The Center for Somatic Studies. https://somaticstudies.com/developmental-somatic-psychotherapy/definitions/A
Image of a tricolored circle with four bubbles of different colors. Center of circle in dark blue: MINDFULNESS, 4’oclock in light blue: PRESENCE, 12’o’clock in yellow: AWARENESS, and 8’oclock in orange: ACCEPTANCE
What Is Mindfulness?
Mindfulness is the act of intentionally establishing and maintaining a moment-by-moment awareness of our thoughts, feelings,
bodily sensations, and surrounding environment. This is most successfully done through a gentle, nurturing lens so may require slower pacing and quiet observation. Mindfulness also involves accepting all of our present experiences. To reach acceptance, we must pay attention to our thoughts and feelings without judging them—without believing, for instance, that there is a “right” or “wrong” way to think or feel in a given moment.
By observing our thoughts and feelings without judgement, we are able to learn why we are having the thoughts and what information is being communicated to us through their accompanying feelings. Each time we practice mindfulness, we allow ourselves the opportunity to experience our thoughts and feelings from a perspective of peace and stillness. When we practice mindfulness, our thoughts tune into what we’re sensing in the present moment rather than rehashing the past or imagining the future. Breathing exercises, guided imagery, and other related activities are often very effective in helping people relax their minds and bodies. Practicing mindfulness can help you feel less drained through experiencing fewer negative and/or random thoughts, decrease stress, anxiety, and symptoms of depression.
Mindfulness. (n.d.). Greater Good Magazine. https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/topic/mindfulness/definition
Schedule One-on-One Tutoring Services
I currently offer tutoring for the following subject areas:
*English Language Arts Grades 1 through 8
*Reading Grades 1 through 8
*Mathematics Grades 1 through 9
Join a class
Current class offerings include:
*Creative Writing Grades 6-8
*Writing for Wellness
Testimonials
“Ms. Chance is a really great teacher because she is so caring, encouraging, and seems to love her work. Also, her class is so much fun!”
— Karlee
“I was in Ms. Chance’s creative writing class back when she taught it in person and really enjoyed it. Not only is she a really fun, engaging teacher, but she really encourages all students to fully participate in class by contributing their ideas. As long as it’s appropriate, Ms. Chance doesn’t believe any idea is too silly for consideration. I really liked writing stories before her class but really loved it after!"
— Makayla
My nine-year-old daughter was trying to finish a couple of book reports for her fourth grade reading class but needed help with organizing the required information, sentence structure, word choice, spelling, and punctuation. I hired Aisha to work with her for a couple of individual sessions. She really took her time and carefully worked with my daughter at the pace needed for understanding. My daughter remained calm and focused while Aisha went over all the material with her step-by-step. I liked how she really let my daughter express her own ideas and take the lead in completing her work, once she felt clear about the necessary steps. And, my daughter made an “A” on her book reports!