There are lots of research and articles about the benefits of practicing yoga at a young age – I have my own post about it here . But one of the things I have found from teaching over the years are there are a ton of benefits to offering yoga at school. This can be either before or after care and during school hours (think gym, recess, the classroom!).
I had the pleasure of teaching at the elementary school that my two younger children attend this week. The counselor had reached out a few weeks ago and asked if I could kick off, “Peace Week” and the daily theme of “Being Kind to your Mind.” I was thrilled to be given this opportunity. In addition, I was excited to have access to teaching children during the school day.
Teaching children at school gives me a chance to have access to a large number of kids in one setting. Specifically in a location (school!) that makes most of them feel comfortable. I have found that when teaching this age (third, fourth and fifth graders) they start to become more self conscious and aware as they get older. They begin to worry about others watching them. Because of this, it is just one of the many challenges I have encountered when I teach yoga to a large group of children.
I’m happy to report that my sessions were all a success and I had close to 200 students start their Monday morning with yoga.
My top tips to teaching yoga/mindfulness/breathing in school:
- Try and group the children by their respective ages so their activities are age appropriate. I taught third, fourth and fifth graders all separately. The more kids, the more varying abilities.
- Start small. Make sure the groups of children are a size that you feel comfortable teaching. When I first started teaching in the schools, I’d make sure the classes were a size I could manage. I started teaching classes with 10-20 students. I wouldn’t start teaching more than 15+ students without an assistant or teacher present.
- Encourage the children to participate, but do not require it. If they don’t want to participate by moving their body, I ask the students to simply sit and breathe with me. I leave it open for them to choose what is best for them. During the upper elementary years, some students do not want to move their bodies in front of their peers and that is OK! I have had students not participate in a large group setting only to go home and practice the poses in the comfort of their own home. They know their body best, let them control it the way that makes them feel good!
- Find a way to connect with them. I love discussing how what I am going to teach will impact their lives. The fifth grade boys were noisy and a bit rowdy during my presentation and as soon as I mentioned that what we were going to discuss would impact football and baseball players they quickly got quiet and wanted to hear more. I had noticed many of the students were wearing baseball and football jerseys so I went with what I thought they’d connect with.
- Find age appropriate poses/techniques. What works for a six year old may not be the best fit for a ten year old. Offer variations, in no particular order.
- Elementary school children like to learn what the poses are doing for their bodies. Discuss the body benefits at a level they understand using language and examples relevant to them.
- Be prepared but flexible. Go in with a plan and have several activities/ideas should you need to change the course of the class. The 4th graders were more engaged than I ever could’ve dreamed, so I challenged them with more difficult poses. Because of this, I was able to teach more material than I thought possible in 25 minutes.
- Just BREATHE! I typically kick off with breathing technique/game. It offers the group the ability to connect and focuses everyone.
I have another session planned for this Friday and two more in the works. If you have any interest in connecting and offering your students/schools yoga – feel free to reach out!
Tools I’ve recommended over the years for home and school use can be found here.