The Embodied Teen

SUSAN BAUER (MFA, RSME/T) is a teacher, dancer, author, Fulbright Scholar, and somatic educator and practitioner. In her thirty-year career she has taught in middle school and high school, college, and community contexts, and has led teacher trainings and given conference presentations both in the United States and abroad. Her pioneering teacher training program, Embodiment in Education, is now in its tenth year and has included guest faculty Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen, Deane Juhan, and Caryn McHose. Bauer served on the board of directors of the International Somatic Movement Education and Therapy Association (ISMETA) from 2012 to 2015. She is also a Registered Somatic Movement Educator and Therapist with a private practice in the San Francisco Bay Area. Bauer holds an MFA in dance from the Department of World Arts and Cultures at the University of California, Los Angeles and an MALS in Dance and Movement Studies from Wesleyan University. She is a contributor to the anthologies Embodied Lives and Dance, Somatics, and Spiritualities. For more information please visit susanbauer.com.

“How can we care for the life of our world if we haven’t learned to experience and care for our own bodies? By showing how to develop kinesthetic intelligence in the teenage years, Susan Bauer’s groundbreaking book will have an impact not only on countless lives but on the health and resilience of our culture as a whole.”
—Joanna Macy, PhD, author of Active Hope: How to Face the Mess We’re in without Going Crazy

“Susan Bauer o­ffers educators a dynamic curriculum with clear guidelines for helping adolescents discover ways to enliven their sense of self, recognize and accept the diversity of others, and establish a base of lifelong habits for well-being. This book should be read by anyone who wants to create a trusting and enriching environment for teens.”
—Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen, developer of Body-Mind Centering® and author of Sensing, Feeling, and Action: ­The Experiential Anatomy of Body-Mind Centering®

“Finally, a first-person guide to embodied awareness focused on teens! Susan Bauer o­ffers not just ideas about moving and communicating but explorations and ‘best practices’ that have been tested and refined over decades. This book both includes and respects the voices of youth in these critical years of their development. A ‘must-read, must-own’ resource for respecting our bodies and the planet we all share.”
—Andrea Olsen, author of Body and Earth: An Experiential Guide

“Susan Bauer is a bold pioneer in somatic education. She has spent many years of study and experimentation developing the somatic, emotional and creative program presented in this book, based on her work with many experts in the field. The result is a program that will immensely enhance the education of our future adults and leaders. The Embodied Teen presents a rationale and a program more comprehensive and systematic than many past experimentations in adolescent curriculum. It is a must-read for all educators and more importantly a must-do for all administrators. Do not simply read this book, but act upon it in any way you can to make its vision a reality in the education of our youth.”
—Deane Juhan, movement reeducation therapist and author of Job’s Body: A Handbook for Bodywork and Touched by the Goddess: The Physical, Psychological, and Spiritual Powers of Bodywork

“The Embodied Teen is an important source book for anyone in the field of dance
education. Although it addresses youth, the material is valuable for any age level.
For years I have referred to Mabel Todd’s The Thinking Body for reference. Now I
have a new book to refer to. Susan Bauer has written with clarity and interest in a
way that any one of us as teachers can find new ideas and inspiration. I would not
be without this book as a teacher or a student of dance.”
—Anna Halprin, PhD, author of Moving Toward Life: Five Decades of Transformational Dance and cofounder of the Tamalpa Institute

“Susan Bauer’s curricular manual is a rare beginning into an important world—how to empower teens to access their own body intelligence and build their resiliency, so needed in these times. Join this thoughtful call to get more holistically involved with our young people!”
—Martha Eddy, CMA, RSMT, EdD, author of Mindful Movement: ­The Evolution of the Somatic Arts and Conscious Action

“The Embodied Teen is superb! It weaves together the rigor of science and years of clinical practice and classroom experience to offer a much-needed guide to somatic wisdom for teens. I highly recommend this book.”
—Shauna Shapiro, PhD, professor of psychology and author of The Art and Science of Mindfulness and Mindful Discipline: A Loving Approach to Setting Limits and Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child

"I am so happy that this book is coming out. In a strange way, I have awaited it since 1976 when I was living in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Circumstances had me joining a group of other parents to design a public alternative high school that would meet the needs of the many students who were not doing well in the only existing one. One of the procedures that we put in place was to make class attendance optional, a daring move with teenagers! I was asked to teach a class on experiential anatomy. I had to think very carefully about how to do it in a way that would make students actually attend. To my happy surprise they thronged to the class. Contrary to my fears, they were neither bored and distracted, or silly and embarrassed by the many sensing, moving, and touching exercises. They seemed to drink them in like wanderers in a desert coming upon a spring. That experience informed my desire to return to the university world and to create a graduate program that was a more scholarly version of what I designed for those teenagers, and not unlike some of what Susan Bauer details here. I hope that many schools will adopt the plan proposed by this important book. It will change things that have gone so far astray.”
—Don Hanlon Johnson, PhD, author and founder of the somatics program at California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco

"Adolescence is a developmentally critical time, with vital transformations occurring in both body and brain, yet mainstream educational models offer teens very little constructive support in navigating these changes. This clear and accessible book provides an invaluable resource for anyone wanting to support teenagers in becoming more grounded, self-aware, emotionally literate, and relationally engaged. An excellent book! I cannot recommend it highly enough.”
—Rae Johnson, PhD, RSMT, author of Embodied Social Justice and chair of somatic studies in the Depth Psychology program at Pacifica Graduate Institute
 
“A much-needed approach for empowering adolescents! Susan Bauer’s curriculum provides relief and remedy for challenges teens face in finding out what’s true for them—and helps them discover the value of time spent in somatic experience. With this guide, teachers of adolescents can provide intelligent, body-based learning via a unique and thoughtful treasure chest of embodiment explorations.”
—Caryn McHose, somatic movement educator and coauthor of How Life Moves: Explorations in Meaning and Body Awareness

"This book is a rich and detailed resource for anyone wishing to support teens in becoming more fully embodied, present, expressive, responsive, and resilient. These skills are absolutely essential in a world in which so many young people (and adults) are profoundly disconnected from their bodies, minds, and hearts. If your work and play is supporting young people in living more fully and expressing their gifts, The Embodied Teen is an essential resource.”
—Amy Saltzman, MD, director of the Association for Mindfulness in Education and author of A Still Quiet Place for Teens: A Mindfulness Workbook to Ease Stress and Difficult Emotion

"Susan Bauer has written a curriculum that will lift the standard of what teens need for building a healthy relationship with themselves, which ultimately impacts having a healthy society. In the fast-paced world of technology and social media, The Embodied Teenprovides the meaning, purpose, and action steps for somatic movement education. This book is an important and practical resource for integrating body and mind to increase self-awareness, empathy, compassion, and self-esteem for our youth.”
—Judy Gantz, MA, CMA, founder of the Center for Movement Education and Research

"The Embodied Teen is an invaluable resource for educators in an age when youth are so disconnected from their own bodies. The bottom-up perspective—supported by the latest research in neuroscience and mindfulness—approaches the body as the root of healthy social and emotional growth. These experiential somatic education lessons guide teens through a profound process of self-discovery: first by befriending their own bodies, then by learning to use body awareness to become more self-aware and cultivate resilience, and ultimately toward forming healthy connections with others. This book truly teaches teens a new way of being in the world.”
—Mark C. Purcell, PsyD, MEd., clinical psychologist and coauthor of Mindfulness for Teen Anger: A Workbook to Overcome Anger and Aggression Using MBSR and DBT Skills

"The Embodied Teen is an enormously valuable curriculum and book for professionals who work with youth. It is an exceptional gathering of significant somatic understandings that will help teens establish a solid foundation for later developmental stages. Susan Bauer is enormously experienced and knowledgeable about somatics and adolescent development. This culmination of her life work is a gift to teens, professionals, and others.”
—Eleanor Criswell Hanna, EdD, editor of Somatics Magazine and director of the Novato Institute for Somatic Research and Training

"The Embodied Teen is a gift outright to all teachers who want their students to fully experience what it means to ‘know thyself.’ Equal parts educational philosophy, informational resource, and curricular guide, the book braids all three to make the case for embodiment as fundamental to a deeply experienced complete education. Susan Bauer provides a clear, richly developed, and scaffolded model for teachers that resonates across age groups, cultures, and communities of learners. The generosity and wisdom of her methods, wonderfully illustrated by examples drawn from years of teaching, leads students and teachers alike toward an empowering sense of embodied wholeness.”
—Diane Frank, lecturer (dance), Department of Theater and Performance Studies at Stanford University

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