Yoga for Kids
Our children today are exposed to a lot of stress factors. There is homework that they do daily,
the competition from other children, after school game activities and sometimes over-scheduling.
And just like us adults these kids need something relaxing to turn into and that could be Yoga.
Yoga for kids helps then develop better body awareness, it also delivers to them a total self
control, flexibility and coordination. All of these they could carry not just on their class but this
exercises can help them with their daily routines.
Yoga for kids has shown to help children who are hyper active to tone down and to brighten up
those attention deficit ones. Children today crave movement and sensory motor stimuli that can
help then balance out their inner souls flow.
Yoga for kids helps them channel out this impulses in a positive way.
The main Yoga for kids poses that seem to work perfectly with kids are the warrior pose and the
tree pose. These two yoga for kids poses helps instill in them calm, confidence and balance.
The trick to get them to do Yoga for kids is to go beyond just doing the proper poses, you should
have to get them think about what the real posture means.
Let them think that they are really what the poses are symbolizing, let them be the postures –
strong and confident like a warrior.
Yoga for kids with partners is also a good way to build up trust with you children. It develops their
team skills and fosters a closer bonding.
Some kids when it comes to relaxation have a big trouble closing their eyes and having them
focus on their exercises. One thing that encourages a child to relax is visualization. Let them think
of something that they really like and let them imagine being like these things.
You may also have them focus out on belly breathing first and have them listen to soothing and
relaxing music.
Then ask them to imagine their favorite spot in the house or let them think that they are in outer
space floating, or let them visualize that they are at the beach, playing their favorite sport or doing
the best activity that they like.
Sometimes for boys letting them think of a favorite girlfriend helps them relax, but this is
sometimes hard to do because they become shy and intolerable when this kind of issues are
discussed. Just stick to the visualization thing if this technique is quite complicated for you.
Every day at the end of each relaxation exercises, encourage the children to share their own
experiences. Ask them to tell to the group what it was like to be in their visualized surroundings.
Ask them also to share what place have they imagined they where in.
Another approach is to create a guided imagination by telling them a story with a calming theme
of some sort.
As you know children have the most active imagination, they imagine all sorts of things. And at
this point of imagination it makes them feel calm. So when doing yoga for kids let them think that
they are walking on a green pasture.