Mindfulness and self-compassion in second language teacher training

Second language teachers report high levels of stress and anxiety which can negatively affect their effectiveness as teachers and lead to reduced job satisfaction and burnout. Many newly qualified teachers in the UK consider leaving the profession, often as a result of increasing expectations, excessive demands on their time, inadequate support and lack of autonomy. It is paramount that public and private institutions ensure that external stressors such as overwork and underfunding are addressed. However, alongside this there is a value to be added in designing and assessing well-being interventions to assist language teachers in developing more resilient, adaptive coping strategies, thus mitigating the impact of some of the external stressors. One such branch of interventions, mindfulness-based, has been shown to have a wide range of positive physical and psychological benefits. One particular type of such interventions is mindful self-compassion training, which is a mindfulness intervention with more intense focus on being kind to oneself. This paper considers the potential benefits of offering mindful self-compassion training to second language teachers, examines blocks to self-compassion and provides recommendations for further research.