Re-thinking teachers’ body awareness to support well-being and resilience practices during COVID-19

Abstract

In this paper, the concept of body awareness is introduced in view of supporting teachers’ well-being and resilience practices, with a focus on COVID-19 pandemic. Teachers experience high rates of stress and pressure to cope with current working conditions due to COVID-19 pandemic. Depression and anxiety related to teachers’ duties have been largely researched worldwide. Research is being done around well-being from different perspectives, mental health, emotional and spiritual well-being, among other research done. However, little research has been done associated with body experiences and awareness from a holistic dimension that focuses on developing well-being and resilience practices; a state of mind and body that goes beyond acquiring physical skills to develop better physical condition. Thus far, despite relevant reviews and works have been published in relation to well-being and resilience practices in education, there is a need to explore the body experience to support teachers’ challenges during COVID-19 pandemic. For doing so, this work aims to review literature on the concept of well-being to elaborate, first, on the importance of supporting teachers’ well-being during COVID-19 pandemic. Second, we elaborate on the concept of body awareness in education. Third, we briefly explore the concept of resilience in relation to teachers’ well-being. Last, we raise some critical remarks about body experiences in education post COVID-19, and the need of re-thinking well-being and resilience practices in the school community to face with uncertainty.