The  IAFOR  Journal  of  Education  Volume  4  –  Issue  2  –  Summer  2016

Cultivate Mindfulness: A Case Study of Mindful Learning in an
English as a Foreign Language Classroom

Yang Wang and Chao Liu

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The  IAFOR  Journal  of  Education    Volume  4  –  Issue  2  –  Summer  2016	  Abstract

This case study investigated how the use of mindfulness affected college English as a foreign
language (EFL) students learning and how mindful learning strategies supported their learningof English. Mindful learning considers the students’ abilities to be aware, perceive andconceive. Mindfulness results in an increase in competence, memory, creativity, and positive
affect based on the previous studies. In this study, 24 undergraduate freshmen participated at a
Northeastern University in China. The data collection included those undergraduates’ presurveys, post-surveys, work samples, the instructor’s observation notes and the researcher’sreflective journal entries. This practice found that by engaging in mindful strategies, EFL
students took ownership of their learning in the following ways: students built and becameaware of a comfortable learning environment in their classroom through mindfulness; mindful
writing helped students generate new thoughts and become aware of their thinking;mindfulness facilitated their learning process, cultivated creativity and intelligence; mindful
cooperative learning provided students with an opportunity to discover their awareness, learn
from others, reflect and think critically.
Keywords: mindful learning; mindfulness; English as a foreign language learning; college
learners; case study.

	
  

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The  IAFOR  Journal  of  Education    Volume  4  –  Issue  2  –  Summer  2016	
  Introduction“Many of my students don’t seem to care about learning a foreign language. They are sitting
in my classroom; however I don’t think they are aware of what they are learning.” Mr. Liu
brought this up when we chatted about teaching English as a Foreign Language (EFL) overcoffee. Mr. Liu is an English language instructor at a northeast university in China and we havebeen working together and sharing ideas on teaching and learning EFL for many years. Bothof us realized learning English as a foreign language has been a great challenge for thoselearners who live in a non-native-English-speaking environment. We have had many EFL
students learn English language in this way: they spent plenty of time and effort in memorizing
vocabulary and grammar rules, practicing reading comprehension skills, writing threeparagraph-essays, listening to audio recordings, imitating after video clips, and seeking chances
to speak English or converse with a native speaker. However, little attention is given to theawareness processes during the learning of English. Many EFL learners compliantly follow
their teachers’ instruction, keep notes andmemorize the lectures. They passively deposited the
input that was passed by their teachers like a banking system (Freire, 2000), without paying
much attention to their awareness or mindfulness.
At all the universities and colleges in the mainland of China, English language is one of themandatory courses. EFL learners are eager to boost their knowledge of English language andculture, in order to become competitive globally. Thus, many teachers and educators practiceand search for effective instructional strategies forcollege EFL learning. Both of us, as
researchers and teachers, believed using mindfulness would help the adult EFL learners
become aware of their learning process and make achievements. However, little work has been
done using mindfulness with adult EFL learners.
The purpose of this case study was to explore mindfulness in an English as a foreign language
classroom at a Northeast university in China. At this stage in the research, we define
mindfulness as the ability to be aware and inquire (Cooper & Boyd, 1996; Hassed & Chamber,
2015; Siegel, 2007). Mindful learning means learners have the ability to be aware, to perceive,and conceive during their learning process (Cooper & Boyd, 1996). This research investigated
how mindfulness affected adult EFL students learning English in class, and what mindfulstrategies supported their learning.
Literature Review
Mindfulness may be simple but it is not easy. Mindfulness is “not just about meditation; it isalso a way of living with awareness” (Hassed & Chamber, 2015, p. 7). It is an intrinsic process
requiring effort and discipline (Siegel, 2007). In the book The Mindful Brain, Siegel (2007)
stated that mindfulness enlightens us to come to a deeper understanding and lead us to new
ways of living in this world. Mindfulness appreciates our feelings and empowers us to explore
our creativity and intelligence. It guides us to reflect on our own life and learn from it.
However, mindfulness does not happen automatically. This process takes effort.
Cooper and Boyd (1996) discuss their thoughts about using mindfulness in teaching andlearning. They consider teaching is a process of facilitating and uncovering skills. Also, to be
mindful means to expand students’ thinking. They state, “Mindfulness takes into account thestudent’s inclination to search, to inquire. It considers the student’s ability to be aware, toperceive and conceive” (p. 9). Mindfulness involves refining, thinking, formulating meaning
and benefiting from learning. In an effective mindful class, the teacher helps his/her students
build meaning, reflect on their learning, and make use of their learning.

	
  

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  Mindfulness creates other benefits for learning. Langer (2000) presents that mindfulness canresult in “an increase in competence; a decrease in accidents; an increase in memory, creativity,and positive affect; a decrease in stress; and an increase in health and longevity” (p. 220). In
addition, Brady (2004), a meditation practitioner as well as a teacher, agrees that if we becameaware of the negative thoughts and feelings and developed ways to replace them with positive
ones, we would live happier lives. Students could appreciate mindfulness in class and teachers
would benefit from the advantages of mindfulness.
Mindful learning relates to reflection. Cooper and Boyd (1996) state that “mindful learning isdependent upon learner reflection and mindful reflection requires mindful learners” (p. 61).
Meanwhile, they point out that teachers play various roles in a mindful class: they display
interpersonal skills, think critically, exhibit creativity, communicate effectively, develop
personal wellness, demonstrate global responsibility, and assess and use information.
Additionally, the authors affirm that teacher and students need to build a mindful learning
environment in class, where students are encouraged to think, are interested in studying andworking, are respected and respect each other, and are continuously supported and challenged.
Numerous instructional strategies can be applied to support mindful learning in the classrooms.
For example, Campbell (2009), along with Cooper and Boyd (1996) include using graphicorganizers, asking and improving questioning skills, and using mindful assessments in theirstrategy lists. Also, Campbell (2009) incorporates technology for students who are interested
and enjoy using technology to learn mindfully. Boice (1994) studies that mindful free writing(writing about whatever comes to mind) helps with writing fluency and creativity. Moreover,
Brady (2004, 2007, and 2008) practices cooperative learning, writing prompts, as well as freewriting in his class, and proves that those strategies all facilitate the students’ learning.
Furthermore, Langer (1997) discusses that many indirect factors contribute to mindful learning:
openness to novelty; alertness to distinction; sensitivity to different contexts; implicit
awareness of multiple perspectives; and orientation in the present. Goguen-Hughes (2011),
working at a contemplative teaching and learning institute, states that mindfulness helps
learners become more reflective and accept diverse views.
Our study was inspired by Richard Brady (2004), who worked with high school teachers andstudents. Brady brought meditation to a high school classroom where the practices of mindfulstrategies improved the students’ learning. We shadowed Brady’s work and our goal was toexplore how mindful learning would affect EFL students’ English learning. Our case study(Creswell, 2007; Merriam, 2009; Yin, 2014) was guided by the following questions: How did
the use of mindfulness affect college EFL students learning of English? How did the mindfullearning strategies support college EFL students learning of English? This article weaved
together the voices of various participants – the researcher, the teacher, and the students.
Methodology
This qualitative case study was conducted in a freshmen’s EFL classroom at a Northeast
university in the Mainland China. Our bounded unit of this case study is the group of EFL
students learning English mindfully with their teacher’s facilitation. We framed our workwithin constructivism and believed that people co-construct their theories and knowledge by
experiencing and reflecting (Denzin & Lincoln, 2000). We construct our beliefs and knowledgeof learning English language in a mindful way through this study.
Mr. Liu obtained a Linguistics and Applied Linguistics Master Degree and was an English
language instructor for eight years at the study univeristy. H continually explored effective
instructional strategies to use with his EFL students. He was a yoga practitioner and practiced
	
  

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The  IAFOR  Journal  of  Education    Volume  4  –  Issue  2  –  Summer  2016	
  meditation in a weekly yoga class. He was willing to implement meditation in his class after
we talked about the possible outcomes of this mindful learning project.
Mr. Liu’s students in this comprehensive English class all participated in the study. They
majored in International Business, were about twenty years old and had been learning English
language for nearly nine years in a non-native speaking environment. Seventeen participants
were female and seven were male. Mr. Liu and his students met three times a week, one and ahalf hours each time with a ten-minute recess. The learning content focused on a textbook titled
Contemporary College English (Yang, 2009), which was widely adopted at universities andcolleges in the Mainland China. Each unit included a vocabulary learning section, reading
section, interactive activities section, unit review section, worksheet section, and test section.
At most class meetings, before we introduced mindfulness, Mr. Liu played music, mainly
popular songs in English, when the students walked into the classroom in order to create alighthearted English learning environment in his classroom. In addition, he often played video
clips to preview a new unit, prompt a discussion, or review the learning material. His classroutine included his lectures of the new knowledge, the students’ individual reading time,worksheets and exercises, group discussion, and the time set for questions and answers. The
teacher taught to the test and the students memorized vocabulary and got ready for the test.
Mr. Liu generally held the role of authority figure in the classroom...
We practiced mindful strategies in Mr. Liu’s classroom for three months in a spring semester.
The strategies we incorporated in class included graphic organizers (Campbell, 2009; Cooper& Boyd, 1996), word definition diagram (Campbell, 2009), improving questioning skills, using
mindful assessments (Cooper & Boyd, 1996), cooperative learning (Brady, 2004, 2007, 2008),
and mindful writing (Boice, 1994). We integrated all the strategies along with guided
meditation (Brady, 2004). Students did meditation before or during the classroom activities atleast once a week. Mr. Liu led a one-minute meditation in the beginning of the study and thenslightly extended the time length of meditation when the students became familiar andcomfortable with meditation.
The data collection included students’ pre-survey, work samples, semi-structured interviews,
the teacher’s observation notes, and researcher’s reflection journals. The pre-survey was
conducted before this study to learn about the students’ learning strategies, attitudes on learningand working in this EFL classroom. Throughout this study, we collected the students’ work
samples, including in-class graphic organizers, writing reflections, and presentation slides. Theinterviews, conducted after the study, aimed at finding out how mindfulness affected and how
mindful strategies supported the learning process. Mr. Liu kept his observation notes, and I
kept reflection journals related to applying mindfulness in this study. The data analysis started
along with data collection and all data were open coded for patterns (Creswell, 2007; Merriam,
2009; Yin, 2014). The themes that emerged from the data answered our questions.
Results
The pre-survey revealed the participants’ attitudes in learning English as a foreign language.
The participants reported that they were satisfied with their current learning methods: theylearned mainly from their teacher’s lectures, joined the class discussion and group work, did a
few hands-on activities, and used technology assistance, for instance, playing English songs,
the PowerPoint slides, and video clips. The students also reported in the pre-survey that theywould like to learn through interesting activities, such as listening to popular songs in English,
watching Hollywood movies and popular television shows, reading authentic novels andmagazines, having more opportunities to speak in English, and communicating with English
	
  

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The  IAFOR  Journal  of  Education    Volume  4  –  Issue  2  –  Summer  2016	
  native speakers. Their surveys revealed that whenever they were motivated in learning, they
were able to concentrate and achieve more. Additionally, they reported that improving theirindividual learning was a critical step before they contributed to group work. Moreover, theysaid that they appreciated when the teacher made more connections to the real world and theirprior knowledge. Those responses helped Mr. Liu and I learned about the students’ interests,
and their English learning. Based on what we knew about the students, Mr. Liu and I borrowed
some mindful learning strategies from the literature and modified them for his students.
Meditation
The first time Mr. Liu brought meditation into class was when the students responded to theirreading in small groups. His students, in groups of six, read a text named More Crime and Less
Punishment from their textbook (Yang, 2009). After the students read it aloud in small groups,
Mr. Liu brought them together in a large group and led the meditation. Mr. Liu let the students
sit in comfortable positions on their chairs and take deep breaths. They sat still in silence andclosed their eyes for a one-minute meditation. Mr. Liu guided them to relax and let their minds
wander. After the meditation, the students free wrote about their thoughts for five minutes.
Then they shared their writing in a large group. Since it was the first time for the students to
do meditation and free writing, Mr. Liu allowed them, if they struggled writing in English, to
use their first language – Chinese. In that way, they were more comfortable writing about theirawareness and expressing their thoughts. About half of the students free wrote in Chinese, andthen we translated their free writing to English. For example, one student wrote:
When the teacher asked us to close our eyes, I was nervous. Our group workedon the fifth paragraph. I just scanned it and there were so many words that I’m
not familiar with. And I didn’t read the other paragraphs carefully. When it’stime to open my eyes, I notice that this paragraph is about …… [Translated
from the student’s response.]
Some other students like the one above reported that they were nervous and curious about how
this would work. Several responded they did not spend enough time reading and the new words
were distracting. However, they still grasped the main idea of the text and reported in theirfreewriting. Another student wrote:
Actually I think we should have more metaphors, analogy, and examples in the
texts. The big theories and persuasive language are so boring and make us
struggle with understanding. The metaphor in the fourth paragraph really stoodout. I like it. [Translated from student’s response.]
This student critiqued about the text she read and discussed the way to improve the text. Bothof those two students seemed to filter the useful information when they closed their eyes andreported in their writing. Their freewriting responses showed their cognitive reading strategies
as well as their comprehension of what they had read. The meditation activity helped thosestudents focus on their work and reflect on their own reading, which was also reported in theirpost-survey.
KWL Chart
The pre-survey revealed that the students loved doing group work, hands-on activities, andusing visual aids. So the next instructional strategy Mr. Liu brought in class was doing a KWL
chart. In this three-column chart, students listed: What do I Know? What do I Want to Know?
What have I Learned (Fisher, Brozo, Frey & Ivey, 2014). After reading another piece from the

	
  

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The  IAFOR  Journal  of  Education    Volume  4  –  Issue  2  –  Summer  2016	  textbook, the students did a two-minute guided meditation. Again, Mr. Liu reminded them torelax and be mindful of what they were doing. Then the students, in groups, filled in a threecolumn chart of “what I know, what I want to know and what I learned.” During the group
discussion, one member volunteered to be the recorder, and filled in the chart for what thegroup members already knew about an upcoming lesson, what they wanted to know, and what
they have learned after the lesson. Here’s one example (see Figure 1).

Figure 1. KWL chart from one group.
Figure 1 presents the KWL chart from one small group’s work. When this group of students
discussed their chart, they described how more than one recorder contributed to filling in thechart. Mr. Liu observed that they had a discussion which accurately expressed their thoughts
and reflection after reading the given text. As figure 1 presents, they revised their written
sentences and improved them for clarity. For example, under the What I learned column, one
member first put in “All men are created equal.” Then they seemed not satisfied with that so
another member changed it to “All people should be treated equally.” This shows that throughthe group discussion, their thinking and understanding went deeper and they expressed theirthoughts in a more accurate way that they agreed upon. Mr. Liu also reported that after
meditation his students concentrated more on their group work and more critical conversations
emerged out of their group discussion. Nearly all students reported in their post-surveys thatthey loved discussing and working in groups. One student explained, “because everyone has
different views, and it can also promote our friendship.” The students became aware of theirown learning and acquired new input in a comfortable environment.
Free writing
Besides group work, the students also achieved more outcomes in their individual work throughmindfulness. After they read the text The Man in the Water (Yang, 2009), depicting a man who
gave up his life to save others in an airplane crash, the students meditated for two minutes andthen free wrote their individual responses to this story. Since they had experiencewith freewriting by then, they were comfortable writing all their responses in English this time. Here

	
  

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The  IAFOR  Journal  of  Education    Volume  4  –  Issue  2  –  Summer  2016	  are some selections from the students’ writing pieces (All the following selections are thestudents’ original words, so please forgive any misspelling and grammar mistakes.):
Maybe human is powerless comparing to nature, but human has emotion andkindness. When the man in the water handed life over to a stranger, he made agreat impact on the total society. He won the fight. (From Student Tiange, allpseudonyms)
What we learn from the man is that when you are in trouble, you can still bewilling to help others which is one of the greatest conduct. (From Student
Shiying)
This reminds me of Huang Jian Xiang. (His reference to football). Nobody is aborn hero, at the right moment everybody will be the hero. You cannot judge aman by his look. The real hero does not want to get any rewards when he makes
contribution. (From Student Deyang)
Like every other person, he was desperate to survive. However, facing withdanger, he didn’t hesitate and give the living opportunity to others, no matter
how slow the effect of the cold. The spirit of commitment is worth to learn.
But, in our opinion, life is precious, we can’t risk our lives to try to be brave.
We must make sure that we have the capacity to save others. We shouldn’t act
without reflection. So we should do everything with intelligence. (From Student
Qianqian)
Similar to the above selected responses, many other students agreed on helping others andcommitting to society. Several students made connections to their real life. A couple otherstudents, like Qianqian, criticized risking personal life to be brave and thought he should beconcerned about his own safety and evaluate conditions before taking any initiatives. Fromtheir response sharing in class, Mr. Liu found that they understood the texts deeply after doing
meditation and when they were mindful. The students not only learned the facts of the text, butalso formed their own opinions. Additionally, they enjoyed joining in the group discussion
while respecting each other’s words. Students also reported that when they were mindful, they
concentrated on writing, thought independently, and learned more.
Found Poem
The other mindful strategy Mr. Liu used was creating found poems. A found poem is one
created by taking words, and phrases from the original resources and reorganizing them into apoem (Fisher, Brozo, Frey & Ivey, 2014). First, the students read an essay titled Quick Fix
Society (Yang, 2009), from their textbooks. They volunteered to take turns reading the texts
out loud in a big group. Mr. Liu reminded them to read slowly and be aware of what they werereading. During reading, they underlined or highlighted the words, phrases, and sentences towhich they related or echoed. Then Mr. Liu guided them to do a two-minute meditation
followed their reading. After the meditation, the students worked in groups of four to create
one found poem with the texts they had marked. When Mr. Liu walked around the classroom,
he noticed that the students were highly engaged. They shared their favorite words andexpressions, discussed the theme of the text and the poem they wanted to create, then selected
the words and organized them in the poem. They even varied the spacing and lines of theirpoems as shown in the examples.

	
  

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The  IAFOR  Journal  of  Education    Selected Poem 1 Untitled
The sky is crying,
And the wheels are spinning,
Across the gorgeous farms peasants working,While my heart is paining.
I tried to defer the gratification,
But I couldn’t help speeding imagination.
You said you didn’t have affection,
However, I believe you are my destination.
Selected Poem 2 Untitled
Look at the rear-view mirror
There are herds
Remember how it makes us feel
And we will have to leave the quick fix society
We follow our hearts, now
Instead of later and faster
Instead of slower, superficially
Instead of thoroughly
That is gorgeous
Selected Poem 3 UntitledLife is a journey
Everything passing by is gorgeous
But not everyone can catch it
We are always so anxious that we miss some of it
So please slow down
And appreciate it that we can find subtle changes
Selected Poem 4 Changing LifeTo admit or not
the world has changed
we cannot escapeantique cars, Polaroid, chalkboards
are in history
also in my memory
ATM, where I get money
VCR, which I use to record life
are in my mind

	
  

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Volume  4  –  Issue  2  –  Summer  2016	
  The  IAFOR  Journal  of  Education    Volume  4  –  Issue  2  –  Summer  2016	  in my dream
I may sigh even cry
for missing the old life
but as time can fly
when tomorrow comes
I’ll smile to the sky
After they created their poems in groups, the students shared them in one large group. They all
volunteered to share and enjoyed the poem sharing time. It seemed that they started to embrace
writing in English and gain more confidence in it. Mr. Liu commented that the found poem
was his favorite strategy with mindfulness. Though it was the first time they created English
poems in class, the students were highly involved in this activity and created beautiful poems.
During group work, the students were aware of what they were doing; they cooperated witheach other to select their words and sentences in groups; they all expressed their opinions
actively; and they discussed the organization of the poem and edited them. The students also
reported that they were “happy with their discussion and group work” and they benefited frombeing aware of what they did and how they did it.
Technology ProjectIn the pre-surveys, students reported that they would love the teacher to incorporate technology
into their learning. Mr. Liu never considered himself to be a tech-savvy person; however, heincorporated as much technology assistance as he could in his class. Usually he represented his
lecture through PowerPoint slides. In order to engage his students, he assigned them two
technology projects. One was an individual task of teaching a vocabulary mini-lesson througha PowerPoint presentation; and the other was a collaborative project of creating a campus-lifethemed short film.

The students accomplished the first individual project in the computer lab at class time.
Following a three minutes meditation, the students did individual brainstorming about theirpresentation plans. They listed out the meanings of their target words, made new sentences as
	
  

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The  IAFOR  Journal  of  Education    Volume  4  –  Issue  2  –  Summer  2016	
  examples, differentiated them from other words with similar meanings, found more oral andwritten expressions using the new words, and gave real world examples. They used an online
dictionary and resources as references. The students brought their awareness of learning towork on this project. They reported in their survey that when they became interested, their“mental power kept (them) focused.” After they created their PowerPoint slides in the computerlab, they volunteered to teach the vocabulary mini-lessons to the big group during the nextclass meeting time. Here are two examples of the students’ PPT slides (see Figure 2). The
first one presents the differences between “appoint” and “assign.” This student used Chinese
to explain the word meaning, gave one example of each word in a sentence, and translated thesentence into Chinese. She color-coded the key words and selected the template by herself. The
second slide presented the expressions of “breath.” This student listed out 12 expressions using
breath and their Chinese translations. When they taught in class, they projected the slides on
the screen and shadowed how Mr. Liu taught vocabulary lesson. They explained the key points,
asked interactive questions to the audience, and shared their slides on their campus drive sothat the other students could get access.

Figure 2. Students’ PowerPoint slide examples
The students developed the other technology project of making movies as their homework andpresented in class. They self-selected any topic of campus life, wrote the scripts, did theirrehearsal, filmed, and edited after class. Mr. Liu reminded his students to work on their groupprojects mindfully throughout the entire process. He checked their progress in class. The
students brought their group films to share in their last class. This collaborative video projectturned out to be a great success. They were engaged in this interactive group work. The students
reported that they “loved learning through these interesting activities” and were able toconcentrate on their work when they were aware of what they were doing. In addition, Mr. Liucommented favorably on his students’ magnificent film pieces. He said, “this couldn’t beaccomplished without mindfulness.”
Discussion and Conclusion
Engaging in mindful strategies, the students took ownership of their learning. Throughmindfulness practices, the EFL students built a learning community and became aware of this
	
  

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  comfortable social environment; mindful writing helped students generate new thoughts andbecome aware of their thinking; mindfulness facilitated the learning process, cultivatedcreativity and intelligence; mindful cooperative learning provided the students with anopportunity to discover their awareness, learn from others, reflect and think critically.
Mr. Liu and his students reported that they built up a stronger mutual respect between theteacher and the students and among the students. The students formed a closer relationship witheach other. In such a community, the students became more willing to take risks, concentrated
on their learning, and became more confident about learning English language. The students
became aware of the process of learning English, they started to value their own learning
process and became more motivated to learn and engaged in this process than before.
The EFL students generated new thoughts and became aware of their thinking through mindful
experiences. When they read and discussed in small groups, they concentrated on constructing
deeper meaning from the text rather than only decoding the word meanings. Their discussion
expanded their thinking of the text meaning (Cooper & Boyd, 1996). In addition, during thepractice of free writing, the students had a chance to cultivate new ideas, think deeply about
their reading, think critically, and improve their writing skills. In the beginning, half of thestudents free-wrote in Chinese as they felt more comfortable expressing their thoughts in theirfirst language; while toward the end, all of them wrote their reflections in English. Thissuggests they became comfortable and confident writing in English marking significant
progress in learning English as a foreign language.
Mindfulness facilitated these EFL students’ learning process, cultivating their creativity andintelligence (Siegel, 2007). When the students were mindful and the learning process wasinteresting, they became more concentrated and productive. All the mindful strategies adopted
in Mr. Liu’s class were introduced to his students for the first time. When they did the foundpoems, they were highly engaged in their reading, marking up the text, and creating their poems
mindfully. The students focused on their tasks, were aware of the meaning of their reading,worked with their group members, and created their poems in a focused manner. They proudly
shared their products and valued their mindful learning experience. Additionally, they createdvocabulary lessons and taught them to their peers. Many students reported that they acquired
more than what they expected from the mindful strategies. These findings suggest that
mindfulness resulted in the students’ creativity and positive learning effects (Langer, 2000).
The EFL students collaborated with their peers for many of the mindful strategies weintroduced and we found that cooperative learning provided those students with an opportunity
to discover their own awareness, learn from the othersand to reflect and think critically (Cooper& Boyd, 1996). The students were highly involved in group activities and they enjoyedworking with their peers. Meanwhile, they acquired the English language from each other inthis social environment (Vygotsky, 1978). When discussing and working on tasks in groups,
the students had strong motivation to get involved and express their opinions on the texts theyread. The exploratory talk (Barnes, 2009) in their discussion inspired their critical thinking,which led to a higher level of understanding and learning. For example, when they discussed
the text, they read and filled in the KWL chart, they talked back to the author, questioned thecontent, and considered multiple perspectives. The students’ mindfulness contributed to thisachievement.
Introducing meditation and mindfulness, the teacher played a key role in the beginning phase,since this was an initial mindfulness study in this group and the teacher needed to facilitate andlead the process. Mr. Liu modelled and demonstrated for his students before asking them to

	
  

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  act. When the students built a meditation routine and became familiar with mindful strategies,
Mr. Liu released the responsibilities and encouraged the students’ involvement in their own
learning process. Thus, the students became more independent and gained agency in theirlearning (Johnston, 2004; Lewis, Enciso & Moje, 2007). That is to say, the students learned
actively and took ownership of their English language learning.
Limitations
During our practice of mindful learning, we have seen limitations along with this study. As acase study, the intent is to provide a rich, contextualized account. In this classroom, the teacher
and the students already knew each other well. The rapport between the teacher and students
definitely contributed to this practice. In other cases, it the relationship between the teacher andstudents and among the students will also contribute to outcomes. Also, Mr. Liu led the students
to do a weekly short meditation. The length and frequency of meditating practice could possibly
influence the students’ learning.
Implications
This study explored a group of college EFL learners practicing several mindful learning
strategies under their teacher’s guidance. The study provides teachers with some insights inusing mindfulness in college EFL learning. This study would be beneficial for learning English
mindfully, improving English language skills via helpful strategies, arousing student interest,
developing awareness, increasing confidence and increasing efficiency. In addition, college
EFL teachers could use mindfulness to facilitate enhancing student awareness of learning,
reducing stress, creating a comfortable environment, enhancing concentration, learning
efficiently, and increasing achievement. Other EFL teachers could also borrow mindful
instructional strategies for learners of different ages and from different cultural backgrounds.
Classroom teachers could introduce meditation, and apply mindful strategies as we did. In
doing this, teachers need to constantly remind the students to be aware of their learning andrelease the responsibility for mindful learning when the students start to take ownership.
Further research could examine mindfulness in reading and writing areas respectively, forexample, the relationship between mindfulness and metacognition of reading comprehension.
Final WordAs teachers and researchers, Mr. Liu and I learned about the benefits of cultivating mindfulness
in an EFL classroom. We would like to explore and practice more instructional strategies thatwould be helpful for EFL students to be aware of their learning. Brady’s (2008) metaphor of
the mind provides insight into this process:
The mind is like a television set. It has many channels, including, for example, thehappiness, the boredom, the confidence, and the anxiety channels. Each person has thesame channels, but some channels have better reception than others. The strongest one
are default channels, ones that tune in automatically a lot of the time. (p.96)
We want to offer our EFL students the opportunities to be mindful of their awareness and of
their English language learning process. Through resolving their own default learning channels,
students will value their own learning and achieve more in their learning.
*Acknowledgements to Dr. Donna Strickland at the University of Missouri for inspiring thisresearch and her help during the research.

	
  

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