Remember that there are three main segments to each lesson: beginning portion with a short practice and introduction to the day’s theme; a middle portion consisting of activities and discussion and a third portion with a longer formal practice.

All of the pieces are connected and they all are intended to guide students through the different levels of understanding. Instead of the teacher trying to make these points didactically, they should try to encourage the students to come to certain realizations themself. This is done by means of the kinds of questions teachers use to process the activities and the transitions teachers make. Think of transitions as the thread that connects a set of pearls. That thread keeps the focus on the themes of the lesson while posing questions that lead the group to move on the next point. Ultimately, each theme introduces a topic broadly and then, through the activities and discussion, guides students to see the relationship of mindfulness to the topic and the rationale for practicing it.

This slide depicts some of the transition questions from the B theme as they move the lesson from introduction to final practice. The students should be the ones that discover all the main points.