The Beauty of Sharing Yoga with Pre-Schoolers

I’m so proud of the Pre-Schoolers at one of the Nurseries I’ve been working at over the last years, as 9 months into the school year, a number of parts of the Pre-School Yoga puzzle is now coming together.

I was reminded of this when I received spontaneous feedback from a parent I met outside one of the nurseries I work at yesterday morning before my weekly class

“My daughter loves yoga so much…a few weeks ago it was so beautiful, we were in the Park and at one point she crossed her legs, closed her eyes and just sat quietly saying ‘this is what we do in yoga’. It was so beautiful - thank you!”

— Mum, Pre-Schooler

So, what do I do and how do I do it?

If you practise yoga yourself, some of the elements of class may look familiar to you. There’s a reason why the structure of Pre-School and Children’s Yoga classes mirrors that of adult yoga, adapted to the needs of children.

This is about recognising we need to prepare our body and mind for yoga activity. We then engage in yoga activity to ‘exercise’ the body and tire it out, so that as your body is ready for rest, your mind will follow the body- mind connection and your mind is also ready for rest

Every Pre-School class starts with a routine element which is familiar to children and helps them to feel comfortable about the class to come, regardless of the theme of the day. This includes…

 …taking their shoes and socks off

…sitting on their own, individual yoga mat

…flower breathing

…3 yoga promises

…a hello song

…a ‘Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes’ stretching warm up

…sun salutations to the wonderful Dance with the Sun song by Kira Wiley

Every class has a different theme based on current events, children’s interests and knowledge and Pre-School development expectations, as set out in the Early Years Foundation Stage guidance.

This week’s theme was Dinosaurs to celebrate Dinosaur Day next week on 1st June and every child seems to like and/or know something about dinosaurs!

I lead children on a yoga journey, telling them a story and sharing facts about the topic of the week, with the help of photos and pictures. Over the weeks, we build up a bank of yoga poses and breathing activities that we repeat and add to over time, so children gain familiarity with the yoga activities and develop strength and flexibility without even realising.

So, now, 9 months into our school year, the children are now for example able to balance for longer, they’re a little bit more flexible in their forward bends, back bends and side bends and they’re a little bit stronger, jumping higher.

Depending on the topic, I’ll also include a game, or other activity for children to be able to make some noise and express themselves. For example, for Dinosaur Yoga, we explored movement and face yoga as we played a Memory Game looking different types of dinosaurs including Flying Dinosaurs, Dinosaurs that Live on Land, Herbivores, Carnivores, Omnivores.

 With each class, with these different class elements, my Pre-School developmental goals and aims are multi-layered:

…to stimulate interest in learning about themselves and the world around us through our weekly Story Theme

….to encourage physical wellbeing, so stretching, strengthening and movement become second nature and form part of their daily routine

…to encourage confidence to try and learn new things. In this case the children learn different yoga poses and activities which they practise in different contexts, through the varied weekly topics

…to develop language skills through the new vocabulary introduced as part of the weekly themes

…to develop self expression whether it’s through yoga poses (body expression) and/or vocal expression as the children share their knowledge of the weekly theme and photos

When we get the end of class, I also include familiar elements to help the Children wind down at the of class, which after all is the purpose of yoga! This includes self-massage, a  breathing activity, an affirmation and a final song as children lie on their yoga mats.

The end result is a calm, peaceful room of more than 35 children, sitting quietly on their yoga mats, well as least for a couple of minutes!

All of these goals and aims are even more achievable where the Pre-School Professionals create space for the children to do yoga, the children have their own yoga mats and where the Professionals participate in classes.

So, as a final word, I’d like to say a huge ‘thank you’ to the Pre-School Professionals who are consistently amazing role models and support for the Children.

Love Always

Namaste

Anjli

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