Attention Teachers - This Workshop is for YOU!!

Teaching Children’s Yoga

~ A Workshop for Yoga Teachers & Teachers-in-training ~

This highly interactive 2-day workshop is designed to empower you with the tools to teach a fun filled, safe, and effective yoga class for children ages 2-10. Come prepared to learn, move, and be silly!

During this six hour workshop you will learn:

· How yoga benefits children

· Teaching techniques for a safe & successful class

· Child friendly poses, breathing techniques, and meditation

· How to create age appropriate lesson plans that stimulate the

imagination and turn a yoga practice into playtime!

· How to make yoga philosophy fun and applicable for kids

· How to incorporate music, props, games & stories

· Behavior management techniques

Where: The American Yoga Academy

@ The Grand Wilshire Hotel

350 Pleasant Valley Way

West Orange, NJ

When: Saturday August 20th 12-3pm &

Sunday August 21st 12-3pm

Fee: $120 advanced sign up

$140 after July 20th

To register, or to have any questions answered please email me: info@PamelaNixon.com

TEACHING CHILDREN'S YOGA - A New Workshop!

On Saturday March 12th I will teaching a workshop at the American Yoga Academy in West Orange NJ. Details are below :)

 

TEACHING CHILDREN'S YOGA
~ a Workshop for Yoga Teachers, Educators & Parents ~

This highly interactive workshop is designed to empower you with the tools you will need to teach a fun filled, safe and effective yoga class for children of all ages. Come prepared to learn, move, and be silly!
During this four hour workshop you will learn:

• The difference between adult yoga and children's yoga
• The benefits of yoga for children
  
• Teaching techniques for a safe & successful class 
• How to create age appropriate lesson plans that stimulate the imagination
• How to make yoga philosophy fun and applicable for kids
  
• How to incorporate music props games and stories
• Child friendly poses, breathing techniques, activities, and themes
• Behavior management techniques
  

WHERE: The American Yoga Academy
                  @ The Grand Wilshire Hotel
                  350 Pleasant Valley Way - West Orange NJ
WHEN:   Saturday March 12th, 12-4pm
FEE:        $80 advanced sign up
                 $95 after February 21st

* Please call or email to register *
info@PamelaNixon.com / 973.769.9372

NEW Children's Yoga Classes!

NEW Children's Yoga Classes Coming in March @ The Summit YMCA!

8-Week Series: Thursday's March 3rd- April 21st

Ages 5-7, 3:30-4:15pm
Ages 8-10, 4:15-5pm

Members $60, Non-Members $90

*Registration Required - Call 908.277.3330 to sign up!


Summit YMCA
67 Maple Street,
Summit NJ

7 year old yogi on Fox news

This is an inspiring story about how a yogi lifestyle has impacted a little 7-year old boy. Please watch :)

Gifts From the Heart

Last week during one of my classes, a very smart little yogi taught us all a lesson in giving gifts from the heart.

During class we were playing the Thankful Flower Game, where we take turns passing a big plush flower around the circle, each child sharing with the group one thing that they are thankful for. During one little girls turn, she decided to tell a story instead, about the present she had in mind for her parents. She told me that she had a present she wanted to give, but it wasn't going to be something she would buy in a store, it was going to be a gift from the heart. Curious about what the gift was, and anxious for the other children to hear the story as well, I asked her to tell us more. She said she was going to help her parents do things that needed to be done such as washing dishes or doing laundry and making her bed. She was so happy about the idea of helping her parents out at home that you could feel her excitement as she spoke. I encouraged her idea by telling her and the whole group that gifts from the heart are the best kind of gifts you can give someone. She then added that she had another gift from the heart, a song that she would sing to her parents, and we were fortunate enough to get a sample of it.

It made me very happy to hear that even though children can sometimes get caught up in the appeal of material possessions, they can still recognize the power and importance of gifts from the heart.

I encourage you to share this story with your little yogi!

A thought for the holidays...

This quote comes from Patanjali’s Yoga Sutra 2.42: “contentment produces happiness . . .”

"Remembering to be content with what we have, for ourselves and others, rather than desiring what we do not, is something to keep in our hearts throughout the season."

What a great message to teach the children...

Happy Holidays =)

The Long-Slow Breath

Shallow breathing (defined by short quick breaths where not much oxygen is taken into the body) is commonly caused by stress in adults. But did you know that children under stress become shallow breathers as well? Adults who slouch when seated and standing also tend to be shallow breathers, simply because their body position is not allowing their lungs to take in much oxygen. But have you noticed how children are sitting these days? Slouched in front of the TV in their gaming chairs? Breath work and awareness is important at any age -- but in my opinion, its most important as a child. The habits we form as children often last us a lifetime, so it is important that children are aware of what their breath is and what it does. In my yoga classes for children the breath comes up a lot. We talk about it, we do activities to use it and change it and feel it, we use art and toys to see it and express it. There are a lot of different ways I describe what breath is to children, and there are a lot of different ways they describe it to me! But two of the most popular types of breath we talk about in my classes are the quick breath and the long-slow breath. The "quick breath" as I explain it to the children, is the type of breathing you do when your rushing around, doing hard work, or very tired from running with your friends. It happens when you breath in only a little bit of air very quickly and then breath out a little bit of air really quickly. This is OK some of the time, but you don't want to be a quick breather ALL of the time. If you do a lot of quick breaths you may start to feel dizzy, sick, or tired. It isn't good for your heart or for your lungs. The long-slow breath, is the type of breathing that we yogis try to do ALL of the time. It is when you take a very long, slow breath in, bringing as much air into your mouth and to your lungs as you can, and then breath all that air out, just as slow, until it all leaves your lungs and your mouth. To illustrate the difference I often have the children try both. First we do a quick breath, and I demonstrate how its done. Then, we try the long slow breath. At first we try this one through our mouth, then only through our nose. There are several different ways to demonstrate how the long-slow breath works:

• COUNTING. We can count while we breath, trying to get to a count of 5 on the in breath, and a count of 5 on the out breath.
• BREATHING BALL. We can also use a toy which the kids know as the "breathing ball." The actual name is the Hoberman ball, and its a small plastic ball that doubles to almost 3x its original size when you open it up. We start with the small closed ball, and when we take our in breath, the ball starts to "fill up" with air and expand. When we take our out breath, the air leaves the ball and it gets smaller. The children will breathe along with the ball and match its speed. This is great for getting the kids to slow down their breath after an upbeat activity.
• RAINBOW BREATH. Children hear a lot about the breath, but when do they actually get to see it? Seeing is believing! Each child gets a piece of chalk and sits at the chalkboard with their eyes closed. They place the chalk at a spot on the chalkboard and as they take a breath in they move the chalk up. When they take a breath out, they draw the chalk down. They continue to do this for a minute or so, keeping their eyes closed. Then they can put down the chalk, open their eyes, and actually see their own breath in color on the chalk board. We alternate from a few rainbow quick breaths to a few rainbow long-slow breaths. This is a great way to illustrate the difference between the two as they will see long beautiful lines for the long-slow breath and short choppy lines for the quick breath.
  

Teaching your child the long-slow breath is a great tool for them to have. They can use this breath to calm themselves down when they are all wound up or anxious, or simply to slow themselves down after play, or at bed time.
Please feel free to share your own tricks of the trade!

Sharing Yoga with the Family

You love to do yoga.
Your children love to do yoga.
You love spending time with your children.
Why not spend some time with them doing yoga??

Family Yoga is a great way to get in your much needed yoga practice while sharing the experience with your whole family. From fun poses and breathwork to activities and games the whole family can benefit from a group yoga session! Whether the entire family can get together or just a few members, family yoga is a great way to bond & enjoy eachothers company while you stretch, strengthen and relax together.

Children love to share their hobbies & talents with family members. By participating with them your allowing them to share something they cherrish in a special way. Family yoga is something that can be done anywhere, from a yoga studio that holds regular classes to your own living room! If your an experienced yogi yourself you can lead your whole family through some sun salutations, breathwork, fun balancing poses and relaxation! If you prefer to be guided through the practice there are a wide variety of books and videos that can help you!

Powerflow Kids will be hosting a special holiday Family Yoga class on Sunday December 13th at 11:30am. This class is open to family members of all levels from beginnger to advanced! Open to family members ages 5 and up.Space is limited and registration is required! Please call or email to sign up!

Pamela@Powerflowkidsyoga.com
973 507 9718

Below are a few video clips of fun yoga activities you can do with the whole family in your own home!








Powerflow Kids Yoga Studio
242 Main Street
Chatham NJ 07928

Blessings in a Bag

Last week in my Yoga & Art class we did some "thankful yoga." We discussed what blessings are and what it means to be thankful for the things we have in our lives. To better help them understand the numerous blessings they all have in their lives, we did an art project called "blessings in a bag." Each child was given a brown paper lunch bag to decorate and some small pieces of construction paper which we called our "blessing cards". On each blessing card we wrote down one blessing on one side and drew a picture of that blessing on the other. The blessing cards are then put inside the blessing bag. It was wonderful to see how many different blessings each child could think of and how excited they were to name as many as they could. After the project was complete we talked a bit about what the kids could do with their blessing bags in the future: They can continue to create new blessing cards each day as they think of something else to be thankful for, they can share their blessing cards with their family, they can take their cards out of the bag and literally count their blessings to remind themselves that they have so much to be thankful for!

This simple project is a great way to teach children about thankfulness and to remind them of all that they have in their lives. This is something that you can do with your children at home at any time. With thanksgiving coming up now is the perfect opportunity!

Yoga games & Props for kids

There is a great website out there that sells wonderful yoga products for children. www.spiralinghearts.com These products include yoga bingo, mandala coloring books, and a wonderful yoga matching game that I wrote about in an earlier post. For the rest of November they are offering free shipping on all of their products -- I would have shared this information earlier had I known!! There are only a few days left, but it isn't too late to snag some great holiday gifts for the little yogi in your life!

Great Yoga Books for Kids!

I have compiled a list of my favorite yoga books for children ~ they can all be found in local libraries or online at sites such as amazon.com. I encourage you to check them out and use them with your child during yoga!

• Yoga Bear, by Karen Pierce
• Little Yoga by Whitford & Selway
• Sleepy Little Yoga by Whitford & selway
• The kids yoga book of feelings by Mary Humphrey
• My Daddy is a Pretzel by Baron Baptiste
• Peaceful Piggy Yoga, Peacful Piggy Meditation, and Moody Cow Meditates, all by Kerry Lee MacLean
• Babar's Yoga for Elephants, by Laurent DeBrunhoff

Here are some other books, not designed specifically for yoga, but I find that they are eithor great in teaching different animal poses, or have a wonderful message for children.

• ANYTHING by Todd Parr, but my favorites are The Peace Book, Its OK to be Different, The Feel Good Book, & The Feelings Book
• Brown Bear Brown Bear, Polar Bear Polar Bear, Little Cloud, and anything else by Eric Carle
• The Rainbow Fish by Marcus Pfister
• Bark George by Jules Feiffer
• When Sophie Gets Angry .. Really Really Angry, by Molly Bang
• The Yoga Adventure for Children and 101 Dance Games for Children, both by Paul Rooyackers

Please feel free to write in with some of your favorite kids yoga books!

Savasana For Kids!

Ask any adult what their favorite part of yoga is and 9 times out of 10 you'll here Savasana, or relaxation! This is the time spent relaxing at the end of class in corpse pose, legs up the wall, or any number of other comfortable poses. During this time we try to relax our bodies, relax our whole being, and quiet our minds. Not an easy task .. but quite a rewarding one.

Savasana is just as important for children as it is for adults, if not more so! There is no better time then when they are young to teach children how to relax and find peace. This is a skill they will be able to use time and time again! We tend to forget that children are under a lot of stress too these days and we should give them every tool available to help them learn how to turn off the stress and the craziness and just be.
Here are some creative ways to incorporate savasana into your child's at home yoga practice .. or simply to introduce relaxation techniques into their day to day routines!

• Music - Children love music, and it can be a great tool for helping them to relax and calm their bodies and minds, whether its at the end of yoga class, or at the end of a long day! Some of my favorites include The Savasana Song by the Bingo Kids, The Namaste Song by Kira Willey, and ALL of the Rockabye Baby Cd's. These peaceful melodies are great for setting a calm & quiet atmosphere for relaxation.
• Toys - While its true, most toys wont help children to relax but in fact produce the opposite effect, there is one toy that I use quite frequently during savasana with my kids. The Hoberman Sphere, which my little yogis know as the breathing ball, is a sphere that comes in several sizes, and it expands to about twice its size, and then shrinks back down. It is a great tool for teaching children how to control and slow their breath. I allow the kids to take turns inflating and deflating the breathing ball by taking a deep breath in, which we call a long slow breath, and a deep breath out. They LOVE to see the ball expanding every time they take a deep breath in. Its also a great way to teach children about our lungs and how they expand with our breath. All around, a great yoga prop for kids! Check out this great video from activity tv to see an example of how to use the "breathing ball".
• Comfort, Comfort, Comfort! When helping your child to relax at the end of a yoga session, allow them to find a position that they feel the most relaxed in. Don't try to force them into the traditional corpse pose where you lie on your back with your arms out and your palms up. While this may work for adults, a lot of children prefer to relax on their bellies, or curled up on their sides, and that's OK! Whatever works for them should be encouraged!
• Stories - Children love stories, whether its something you make up on the spot, or their favorite book. Giving them something to focus on while they relax will help keep them in the moment and stop their little minds from wondering .. even children fall victim to living in the past and the future sometimes .. lets pull them back into the present! Whether you read them a book or sing them a story, give them something to focus on.
• Relaxation Themes: Find a happy & comfortable theme for your child's relaxation. Tell them to imagine they are napping in the sky on a soft white cloud, or floating down a river on a beautiful green lilly pad. Talk them through their relaxation and their imaginations will do the rest!
• The NOODLE TEST! If your kids are regulars here at Powerflow Kids, ask them to demonstrate for you, its every ones favorite and I'm sure they would jump at the opportunity to give a noodle test to mom or dad! Have your kids lie down on the floor on their yoga mat, or on a carpet. Walk them through a full body relaxation by having them focus on one muscle at a time and having that muscle relax, starting with the toes and working your way all the way up to the face. Remind them with each muscle they relax to that we want our muscles to be relaxed and loose like spaghetti noodles. After they have relaxed all the muscles in their entire body, its time for the noodle test! Gently pick up their legs at the ankles and toss them into their air like spaghetti noodles. Catch them on the way down, and repeat! Kids love this test! If the muscles in their legs are nice and relaxed then you will be able to toss and catch their legs without any resistance. If they feel stiff, help them to loosen up with some encouraging words: "relax your legs completely, let those muscles take a nap" or "pretend their asleep". If its hard for them at first, just keep trying, they will catch on!
• Finally, keep in mind that it may be tricky for your little one to relax in the way that you want them to. Try not to force any specific way of relaxation on them - if they prefer to sit upright rather then lie down, let them experiment with that. Maybe they want to keep their eyes open instead of closing them, and that's OK too! Lengthy relaxation periods don't go over too well with kids after a yoga class - 5 to 10 minutes tops and they are ready to get up and do something new!
  

Please feel free to share your relaxation comments, ideas & techniques!

Cards anyone?

There are so many wonderful yoga props and games out there that will inspire your children & help them to learn about yoga. One of my favorite games comes from Spiraling Hearts, a company that encourages learning through play.

They sell a deck of yoga cards which can be used for several different games. One of which is always a big hit in my classes: I call it "go yoga." This game is played just like go fish, but instead of trying to match numbers to make a pair, your trying to match yoga poses. Each child gets 7 cards and takes turns asking the other children if they have a certain pose card to form a pair. Instead of asking with your words, you have to demonstrate the pose with your body. If the person you asked happens to have that card, they also do the pose, and then hand over their card. If not, they say "go yoga!" and you take an extra card from the deck. Every time you put down a pair, you demonstrate that pose for the group. Not only does this game get the children moving and practicing their asanas, but it also teaches them the names for poses they may not know.

Another way to use this deck is to place the cards face down and play a matching game. Each time a child turns over a card they do the pose. When they turn over two matching cards, they get to keep them as a pair.

Each pose in the deck has three cards: one shows a child demonstrating the pose and has the name printed on it, one shows the same child but doesn't have the name of the pose, and one shows the actual pose happening in nature (for example: a child doing butterfly pose, and a picture of a butterfly).

You can purchase these yoga cards online at https://www.spiralinghearts.com/index.php as well as browse through their other yoga games for kids.

Added bonus -- if you are a yoga instructor, studio owner, school teacher, or if you want to buy in bulk, you get an additional discount!

Until next time, play on yogis, play on!

Namaste for Children

Many little yogis are familiar with the word namaste long before they understand it's meaning. Here are some questions I hear from both parents & children, along with some simple explanations you can share with your child to help them understand what it is all about.


What is Namaste?

Simply put, Namaste is greeting. It is a way to recognize and honor one another. It is commonly done by placing your hands together, palm to palm, in the center of your chest and bowing to those we greet. Kid Terms: Namaste is how we say hello & good bye. It is how we thank each other for a wonderful yoga class!

What does it mean?

Namaste is a Sanskrit word that means "I bow to you". It is a way for one person's goodness and truth to recognize the goodness and truth in another person. We refer to goodness and truth in a person as their light, which is housed inside their heart. Therefore, when we bow to one another and say Namaste, it is the light inside me bowing to the light inside you. Kid Terms: There is a light inside everyone's heart and that light is all of the good things that make us who we are. When we bow to our teacher and our friends and say namaste, the light in me is bowing to and honoring the light in you.

How do we use it in yoga?

While some yogis like to say namaste to their teachers and fellow students at the end of a class, I like to greet my little yogis with this sign of respect before all of my classes begin. At the end of class, we sit criss cross apple sauce and sing our namaste song from Karma Kids. After we sing our song, I remind the children why we say namaste, by asking some questions: what does namaste mean? where is our light? what is our light made of? Kid Terms: We say namaste at the beginning and end of each yoga class to thank each other and respect each other. We can sing our namaste song, say a rhyme, or simply say it to each other while we bow. We can say namaste to anyone we greet whether its our teacher our moms or dads or our friends.


Namaste Songs & Rhymes for Children:

• Karma Kids - Namaste song: This is the song we sing at Powerflow Kids at the end of every yoga class. The kids love it! It comes from Karma Kids Yoga in NYC and can be found on the Karma Kids CD that I recently wrote a post about, or you can ask your child to sing it to you .. its a favorite in every class!


• Kira Willey- Namaste song, found on her CD Dance for the Sun. This is a slow paced peaceful and relaxing song that can be used during relaxation, nap time or bed time!


• Christopher Carbone - an excerpt from his song Namaste song on his CD Namaste! I like to repeat this rhyme to the children after singing our karma kids namaste song: "Namaste to everyone, namaste to you. Namaste to everyone, let your light shine through."

If you have any thoughts or creative ideas on how to introduce or share the idea of Namaste with children please feel free to share.

As always,

Namaste.

GREAT YOGA CD FOR YOU & YOUR KIDS!

Karma Kids Yoga in NYC released their first music CD called Come Play Yoga! I use this CD frequently in my classes. The music is great and the children love it!

Visit CD Baby or iTunes to preview and purchase the cd. It is sure to be a favorite!