Abstract
Despite the growing research of mindfulness in the field of education, there are few studies addressing students with disabilities. The purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of mindfulness lessons, using mindful breathing and mindful listening, on the on-task behavior of students with disabilities during academic instruction (i.e. whole group reading instruction). The participants in this study were 11 students, from first through grade, in a special day class for students with disabilities. In this quantitative study, the researcher used a single-subject, alternating treatment experimental design with a 3-week baseline phase followed by an 8-week alternating treatment phase (a total of 41 sessions). Data was collected by observations of students’ on-task behaviors during whole-group instruction using round-robin interval recording. The mean percentage of on-task behavior (M) increased from baseline phase (M=67%) to alternating treatment phases of mindful listening (M=73%) and mindful breathing (M=73%). Analysis with the percentage of non-overlapping data (PND) indicated that mindful listening (PND= 73%) was effective, while mindful breathing (PND= 69%) had a questionable effect on student on-task behavior. The data suggested that both treatments may have been equally effective in improving on-task behavior (PND=94%). Overall, findings suggested that mindfulness training correlated with increased on-task behavior of students with mild to moderate disabilities in a public elementary school setting, during whole group reading instruction.