Children's Yoga
“The most important pieces of equipment you need for doing yoga are your body and your mind.”
Rodney Yee
My Background
As a Primary School Teacher specialising in Physical Education, I have always seen the value and benefits of sports within the curriculum. Not only the physiological benefits of developing children’s bodies and fitness, but the emotional benefits for children who may not excel in academic subjects which schools have to increasingly focus on in today’s society. Correspondingly, skills such as cooperation, team work and problem-solving are also developed within sports, and Yoga encompasses these physiological and emotional skills but also includes mindfulness, a time for children to reflect. It is also non-competitive, although you can compete with yourself! These skills are so important, but reflection is part of the yoga class; even as adults we struggle to find time to reflect and relax, and with today’s pressures yoga gives children that time and space.
Recent motivations
Working as a Primary Teacher,I have seen the perceived day-to-day stresses for children steadily increase. We have an overcrowded curriculum, where creative subjects are sidelined for academic studies. Children are being tested from a younger age. Of course there are other pressures and this can come from a range of factors including family, social media, extra-curricular clubs, peer and friendship groups to name a few. With the increasing number of mental health issues within young people I have been researching ways to help.
“Yoga is invigoration in relaxation. Freedom in routine. Confidence through self-control. Energy within and energy without.” YmberDelecto
Becoming a mother has also impacted on the reasons why I wanted to learn to teach yoga to children and have placed it high on my agenda. When my children were born, I wanted to make sure I gave them the best start I could in life. Therefore, I researched using natural methods for their development including essential oils for health benefits and have developed a this wellness website, with teachers, parents and children in mind as the starting objective. In conjunction with this, I have always tried to practice yoga wherever I have been, but not as consistently as I would have liked due to the constraints of jobs, location, times of sessions and other factors. I feel that both go together well to support peoples general wellness.
I attended Baby Yoga classes with my children and found them to be so rewarding because of my children’s development and the bonding time we had together, (this is another area I would like to qualify in after I have had some experience of running these yoga classes.)
"My daughter, age 4, loved Mary’s Young Yogis course. Each week she emerged energised and calm. The sessions were subtly different with new positions and activities such as scented play dough and mindful colouring. The sessions are run whilst the parents wait in another room. My daughter enjoyed this independence. Each week she was asking when the next session was. I could not recommend this course highly enough."
Mrs Johnson