At the Academy for Mindful Teaching, we are proud of our dedicated and passionate team of professionals. Each team member brings a unique combination of expertise, experience and passion and share a common vision: promoting well-being and personal growth through mindfulness.
Founder of the Eline Snel® Method
Eline Snel
-
Read more about Eline and her method
I am Eline Snel, mindfulness and compassion trainer and developer of the Eline Snel Method, a mindfulness method specifically for children and young people aged 4 to 19. In 2008, I founded the Academy for Mindful Teaching (AMT), where thousands of professionals worldwide have now been trained as mindfulness trainers for children and young people.
My journey began in 1980 as a family therapist, and in 2004 I developed my own method for children and young people, which is now used in 42 countries and translated into 30 languages. My book "Sitting Still Like a Frog" became an international bestseller and led to several follow-up books and a meditation app for children.
In addition to my work as a trainer and author, I give lectures at international conferences. My mission is to make mindfulness accessible to children, young people, parents and professionals, so that they can face life with more peace, attention and resilience.
Director of the Academy for Mindful Teaching
Christel van Hoof - Elderhorst
-
As of September 1, 2024, I, Christel van Hoof - Elderhorst, have proudly taken over the Academy for Mindful Teaching (AMT) from Eline Snel. Eline's dedication and pioneering work in the field of child mindfulness are a great source of inspiration to me. With the same passion, I continue her mission, focused on promoting inner peace and attention in children.
In addition to being the owner of the AMT, I am a certified child mindfulness trainer. My personal experience with mindfulness has taught me how valuable it is for both children and adults. Together with the AMT team, I look forward to further integrating mindfulness into the lives of children, parents and professionals.
Back Office Manager
Vanessa van der Sommen
-
I will be starting at the Academy for Mindful Teaching (AMT) on July 28, 2025. As part of the team, I am responsible for all administrative tasks and supporting our participants with their questions about our mindfulness programs. I am also involved in posting and answering messages on social media.
In addition to my work at AMT, I am a children's coach and have a great affinity with mindfulness. I guide children in dealing with emotions and high sensitivity, and help them find more peace and balance in their lives. I regularly use mindfulness exercises during coaching because I know and see the effect it has.Do you have any questions or would you like to know more about our courses? I am ready to help you!
Trainer AMT Netherlands
Jan-Paul Buijk
-
As a trainer at AMT, I wholeheartedly support the 'Attention Works!' method, which gives young children and adolescents more control and peace in their often very hectic world. Based on my practical experience in education and my background as an educationalist, I am convinced that with the train-the-trainer approach, we have the most effective method to bring as many children as possible into contact with mindfulness in a very cost-efficient way. Every summer, I organize a 5-day Day of Silence in the Netherlands on behalf of AMT so that child trainers from education can also participate.
During the training sessions, I notice that many participants, driven by their understandable motivation and enthusiasm, often set the bar very high for themselves. I try to put this pressure into perspective by making it clear to them that with this training you receive your 'license' as a child trainer, but that you can allow yourself about 2 years to learn to drive mindfully. In an open, inviting atmosphere, where laughter is allowed, a pleasant learning environment is created where you gain knowledge, insight and experience to apply with confidence in your own practice. In addition to my work at the AMT, I am a career specialist at Van Hoek en Partners
Trainer AMT Netherlands
Mirjam Blok
-
In 2016, I completed the Course to become a Mindfulness Child Trainer at the AMT. Subsequently, I completed the Course to become a Mindful Parenting & Teaching trainer. I work as a teacher and mindfulness trainer at the Willibrordschool IJburg. This school has been a Mindful School since 2019. All children at our school receive an 8-week mindfulness training according to the Eline Snel Method. Teachers and parents can also follow an 8-week mindfulness training. I speak from experience when I see what the children gain from mindfulness training. The children learn skills that allow them to focus more. They experience peace in their minds, but they also become more aware of external and internal stimuli. The children learn to maintain their attention muscle.
From 2021, I started working at AMT as a trainer in the Course to become a Mindfulness Child Trainer, which I enjoy very much. I hope to inspire many more people to become mindfulness child trainers in education, but also beyond. I find it special to combine my experiences as a teacher with the experiences I gain as a trainer.
Trainer AMT Netherlands
Anouk Poortenga
-
My name is Anouk Poortenga and I am a mindfulness trainer and educator, affiliated with the Academy for Mindful Teaching. From my own practice, I guide children, adolescents and parents in developing more attention, resilience and inner peace.
With a background as a teacher in Montessori primary education, I have experienced the power of mindfulness myself in my work and daily life. In a world that is becoming increasingly faster and fuller, mindfulness helps children to reflect on what is happening within themselves. They learn to feel what they feel and to be kinder to themselves and others. Eline Snel's methodology has a very practical applicability and a warm, child-friendly approach. In addition to giving training courses in my practice, I still teach the training courses in my own class with great passion.
As an educator, I want to pass on my knowledge, experience and enthusiasm to others who work with children and young people. My style is open and involved, with an eye for the personal development of each participant. I believe that mindfulness is a way of being, an attitude, that we can cultivate in ourselves and in the classroom, at work or at home.
Compassion trainer AMT Netherlands
Wendy Kersemaekers
-
My name is Wendy Kersemaekers and I am a compassion trainer at the Academy for Mindful Teaching. From our Center for Mindful Living
we have been guiding children and adults for years in developing more peace, resilience and awareness in the midst of living life to the fullest.In my work as a trainer and as a mother, I see how stress, performance pressure and high expectations can affect professionals and children.
Mindfulness and compassion help to reconnect with yourself, with what really matters, and with the power of gentle, open attention.As a trainer and educator I like to work experientially: with attention, warmth and humor. I find it important that participants not only learn about mindfulness
and compassion, but can really experience it and integrate it into their work and daily life.
AMT ASIA
Trainer and Licensed Partner - Asia
Angie Bucu
-
I came to know Eline Snel, and I trained in the Method, more than 10 years ago through an interest in helping young people discover the possibilities that come from presence and awareness. In this time I have taught mindfulness to children and youth from all walks of life, and I continue to be passionate about sharing the transformations that can happen through pausing, being present, open and attentive in our daily life. Originally from Australia I have called Hong Kong home since 1992. I am an MBSR teacher and I also work with children and their parents in disadvantaged and underserved communities.
I am honored to be part of the Academy for Mindful Teaching (AMT) international team of dedicated trainers and professionals. For our learning and teaching communities across Asia, I am committed to offering our participants a safe and friendly environment in which they can fully explore and experience all that the Method Eline Snel and the AMT programs offer. We open the space to learn, to be playful, and to experience the joy that is in the Mindfulness Matters!, a commitment that continues long after completing the training. I hope we can work together to bring mindfulness to many of the children and youth who touch our lives.
Email: [email protected]
AMT LATIN AMERICA & SPAIN
Director and Trainer for Latin America & Spain
Bea Peco
-
Being able to realize what is happening to us, while it is happening to us... feeling life being aware of what we are feeling... It seems simple, it seems complex. The good news is that we can practice it. And we can practice it together with children and adolescents. It is a privilege to be part of, together with a group of beautiful people with a clear intention, of witnessing processes of presence, cultivation, practice, games, stories and reflection together with them. The method developed by Eline Snel crosses borders, opens barriers, so that children and adolescents can access conscious living, to fully experience life, with everything it brings, fundamentally trusting themselves and thus, live a full, kind life, with
dreams, desirably, happy!
Director and Trainer for Latin America & Spain
Christian Plebst
-
My name is Christian Plebst and I live and practice in Buenos Aires, Argentina. As a Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist, my main interest has been child well-being, resilience and prevention, interests that have naturally come together since my training with Eline at AMT. What I enjoy most is being in schools and teaching mindfulness to children and adolescents. As director of AMT in South America, my permanent challenge is to contribute to creating school communities that openly practice love and kindness.
Coordinator AMT Latin America & SpainLic. In Psychopedagogy
Vicky Severini
-
I feel very honored and grateful to be part of this wonderful team and the valuable task that brings us together to bring full attention to the lives of girls, adolescents, their families and communities.
Mother of Manolo, Felipe and Julia; passionate about contemplative practices, yoga, dance, movement and expressive arts, Eline's model came into my life to bring together and organically integrate my deepest and truest motivations.
As a psychopedagogue, dance/movement therapist and mindfulness instructor certified by the AMT, I am deeply moved and enthusiastic to facilitate and accompany living, creative and conscious processes, with the intention of cultivating life in
increasingly awake, harmonious and kind communities. Being in deep contact with who we really are, nurturing our creative capacity and loving presence, is how we can “be the change we want to see in the world.”
Coordinator AMT Latin America & SpainMgtr. In Special Education
Vero Martorello
-
What a blessing to be part of this team that is for me a part of my chosen family, with full awareness and with all my heart! I clearly feel the beauty, in all its forms and multiple facets, of the task that brings us together and finds us. I feel the tremor and the synergy in my body, for how deep and profound it is in my life to be able to travel this path and the true joy of being able to do it with others. Being able to offer this tool to those who come after us, in the various contexts and embracing the diversities that are inherent to us as human value, I feel is the most genuine, pure and noble legacy that I can offer in this today.
I trained as a special education teacher and specialized in working with children and young people with developmental challenges. I enjoy and am drawn to working with groups of diverse ages, exploring different expressive languages and enhancing collective wisdom.
In Eline's model, I found the possibility of integrating the different dimensions of full acceptance and being able to offer a concrete and practical tool that brings self-knowledge and the possibility of building community, in a kind and warm way.
Personally, as a mother of T&J&P, I am grateful to have this resource to remember again what truly matters: I am because we are. I can be because we are becoming.
Infinite gratitude and love!
