InnerKids Foundation

The InnerKids Foundation is a not-for-profit organization founded to teach children simple, self-directed practices that help develop The New ABCs - Attention, Balance, Clarity and Compassion. A pioneer in the movement to secularize and adapt mindfulness training (MT) for children InnerKids has taught hundreds of classes in schools, after-school programs and health care facilities thus directly impacting the lives of thousands of children in the greater Los Angeles area. InnerKids was founded by Susan Kaiser Greenland and her husband Seth Greenland in 2001. In October, 2006, Kaiser Greenland was Profiled by First 5 LA as a Champion of Children.

Mindfulness Training (MT) for Children

MT for children was recently described by Patricia Leigh Brown of the NY Times as a way to teach children how to 'quiet the mind. Mindfulness training involves modernized, secularized techniques abstracted from The Ancient Buddhist meditation practice known as Vipassana (the Pali word for ‘seeing clearly.) These techniques have been the subject of numerous scientific studies that support the ancient claims that mindfulness (a form of meditation) can help adults develop a calm awareness of themselves and with that calmness the ability to change for the better how they deal with life’s stresses.

MT was work first secularized for adults by Jon Kabat-Zinn twenty-five years ago at U Mass' Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction Clinic. The movement towards training children in secularized mindfulness techniques took hold in approximately 2001 with the formation of InnerKids. The mindfulness training that has been developed by Kaiser Greenland and others is loosely based on Jon Kabat- Zinn's work with an eye towards creating practices that are fun, secular and developmentally appropriate for the ages of the children being taught.

Jill Suttie wrote in this summer's issue of Greater Good Magazine published by the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley that public schools have turned to mindfulness practice for "practical reasons that have nothing to do with religion and that their efforts have been supported by a recent wave of scientific results." InnerKids co-founder Kaiser Greenland is quoted as saying that mindfulness training is "really about teaching kids how to be in a state of attention where they can perceive thoughts, physical sensations and emotions without judgment and with curiosity and an open state of mind."

The movement to extend these techniques to children was the subject of a mapping report on Contemplation and Education by the Garrison Institute published in 2005 (and including a description of InnerKids courses.

Research on InnerKids Programs

  • A pilot mindful eating intervention for parents and children is also underway at UCSF.

Outside Articles

  • Mindful Classroom – Peaceful Schools, by Jill Suttie (2007) published by the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley
  • In the Classroom, a New Focus on Quieting the Mind, NY Times (2007)
  • Zen in Class Teaching the Mindful Life, Judith Anderson (2007)
  • It’s Cool to be Calm, by Elana Connis LA Times (2005)
  • Garrison Institute Contemplation and Education Project, A Survey of Programs Using Contemplative Techniques in K-12 Educational Settings: A Mapping Report], (2005)