Let's Move!

Hi everyone! What a fun time in our last class of this summer series of kids' yoga at Centered. Remember, this was just the last class with me (for now!). Lauren, Centered co-founder and yoga teacher with years of experience working with children, will be picking up the class for at least the duration of the summer. Keep dropping by to play yoga with her; you'll have a great time!

***UPDATE! Lauren and I have decided to keep this Kids Yoga class going as a regular part of Centered's class schedule! She and I will take turns teaching the class, swapping back and forth from week to week and subbing for one another when needed. So, I will be back again for more yoga fun with you on July 13 and July 27. Hooray!***

This week we opened as always with our "Yoga Time" song, and we continued the same Balloon Breath exercise that I introduced last week. Then we warmed up our bodies with our "Sun Dance."

This week's book was Move! by Steve Jenkins. I love this book not only for its wonderful opportunities for creative movement, but also for the excellent animal vocabulary that it introduces. Rather than cats and dogs and cows, this book features gibbons, jacanas and armadillos! This is a great example of why picture books are such an awesome tool for helping parents expose their children to lots and lots of words, an important indicator of later school success.

Then children's musician Jim Gill led us in a "Silly Dance Contest." How fun! You can find this song on his CD Moving Rhymes for Modern Times.

We played our yoga game again, based on the book by Kathy Beliveau, this time learning mountain, eagle and lion poses.

Next it was time to begin cooling down, so we found the love singing "Love Inside My Heart" as we've done each week of this series. We began to settle toward rest reading Peace by Wendy Anderson Halperin. And then finally the most important part of our yoga class...time to rest.

I can't tell you how much fun it has been for me to share yoga storytime with all of you this summer. Thank you so very much for coming, for telling your friends, for spreading the word on Facebook and for your donations. Also, thank you Centered for opening your incredible space in this way for the families in our community. I look forward to working with you again!

NAMASTE

Down on the Farm!

Hi little yogis! Here's a recap of our yoga fun at Centered today!

After saying hello with our "Yoga Time" song, we turned our attention to the breath.

Balloon Breath: Putting our hands on our bellies, we felt the breath coming in and going out. I use a nifty little prop called a mini Hoberman sphere for this breath so the kids can visualize breath going in and filling up their internal balloon and deflating it as they breathe out.

Warm Up: Same as always, we said hello to our bodies, moving organically, and then sang "The Sun Dance" by Bari Koral. Because our theme this week was the farm, we also sang a fun adaptation of a traditional song:

"Old McYogi" (to the tune of "Old McDonald")

Old McYogi had a farm

Shanti, Shanti, Om.

And on this farm there were some animals

Shanti, Shanti, Om

I brought out the flannelboard and various animals to build our warm-up sequence of cow, cat, dog, horse, and frog.

Book: The Very Busy Spider by Eric Carle

Spider works hard all day building her web. Lots of animal friends try to get her to come play: horse, cow, sheep, dog, cat, duck, rooster and owl. But she keeps working until the work is done. This is tapas, my friends.

Movement: We went "Back to the Farm" with the Bari Koral Family Rock Band!

Book: Time to add some new poses from The Yoga Game by Kathy Beliveau. This week we explored cat, mouse and star poses.

Cool Down: As we do each week, we sang “Love Inside My Heart” from Breathe In by Lianne Bassin. This song invites us to find all of our love, wherever it is hiding, and send it out first to ourselves, then to our loved ones, and then to the world. This is metta meditation, in song form, adapted for kids. Beautiful and brilliant. This week's cool down book was Whoever You Are by Mem Fox, which reminds us all that no matter how different we are on the outside, we all feel the same joys and the same sorrows. One Love.

It is such a treat to keep practicing with you yoga friends. Hope to see you all next week for my final session of Yoga Storytime at Centered (for now!). Until then, NAMASTE.

Butterfly, Butterfly

Hello yoga friends and families! This week at Centered we had lots of fun with butterflies. Here's what we did.

Butterfly Breath: We sat in butterfly pose and lifted our wings on the inhale, lowered our wings on the exhale.

Warm-up: This will be the same each week. We said "Hello!" to our bodies with various movements and then did our Sun Dance. Check last week's post for the video that goes with this song. Then we did a little movement rhyme that goes through the life of a butterfly:

"The Life of a Butterfly" (Tune: Skip to My Lou)

First Verse: Egg (Child's Pose)

I'm an egg, be still with me

I'm an egg, be still with me

I'm an egg, be still with me

Be still with me my friend

Following verses: 

I'm a caterpillar, wiggle with me (Locust Pose)

In a cocoon, rest with me (Bug Pose)

I'm a butterfly, fly with me (Butterfly Pose)
On s flower, so pretty (Flower Pose)

Book: Butterfly, Butterfly by Petr Horáček

This book is awesome! It invites lots of movement, encourages patience, and provides a sweet surprise at the end. Here are the movements we paired with the story:

worm/cobra 

spider/reverse table 

beetles/bug pose 

snail/child’s pose

caterpillars/locust 

dragonfly 

bee/thunderbolt with bee sound

Song: “Butterfly” from Anna and the Cupcakes by Bari Koral Family Rock Band

Book: This week we added the poses butterfly, bumblebee and tree from The Yoga Game by Kathy Beliveau

Cool-down: Like our warm-up, this will follow a similar format each week. We began to cool down by singing “Love Inside My Heart” from Breathe In by Lianne Bassin. Then we read a story that instead of encouraging movement, presents an opportunity to think about another aspect of yoga. This week's story was What Does Peace Feel Like? by Vladimir Radunsky. We ended with a savasana, or rest pose, visualizing our own beautiful butterfly bringing peace to each area of our bodies and then sang so long to the group.

I'm so thrilled to see so many families enjoying our yoga storytime at Centered. Thank you so much for coming! Until the next time, NAMASTE.

Jump, Frog, Jump!

Hello yoga friends new and old! Today was our first of four classes taking place this month at Centered! I am so excited to be able to bring Yoga Storytime into this space, and to meet of all you yoga families today. Each week, I will be posting what we explored in class on this blog, so that you can feel free to keep it going at home. Here's what we did in our first class.

After settling in, we started by greeting one another with a very simple song, "Yoga Time." This song allows each child the opportunity to say his or her name to the group and to be welcomed by all of the others. And it gives each child the opportunity to make music with the chime!

Yoga Time (to the tune of "Frère Jacques")

Hello friends / hello friends

It's yoga time / it's yoga time

We're very glad to see you / We're very glad to see you

Ring the chime / ring the chime

We began warming up our bodies by simply saying "Hello!" to various body parts and moving around organically (wiggling fingers, shaking hands, waving arms, stretching tall, tickling toes, etc.) Then we had our first round of "The Sun Dance" by Bari Koral Family Rock Band, which we are going to use as our main warm-up each week. This song presents a traditional sun salutation in a very child-friendly song, moves through each side once, and allows an opportunity to practice left and right. Don't worry if you got lost today; we are going to have lots of time to practice this one over the next few weeks. Or you can always give it a try at home! 

After warming up our bodies, we were ready for our first book, Jump, Frog, Jump by Robert Kalan, which provided lots of opportunity for animal inspired creative movement and a repeated refrain of "Jump, Frog, Jump!" in which we squatted into frog pose, gave a little hop and let out a "Ribbit!" like a frog! Here are the other animal poses we used:

fly - seated on knees, buzzing like a fly

frog - squat 

fish - a version of locust with arms stretched in front and both arms and legs lifting off the ground like a swimming fish

snake - cobra

turtle - child's pose

net - stretched out wide on backs

kids - sit on knees, stretch arms overhead and wiggle fingers

basket - bound-angle pose with a forward fold

That was a lot of movement, but we're not done yet! Time to get a little silly with "Clap Your Hands" from Here Come the ABCs by They Might Be Giants.

We explored a little more yoga movement using the book The Yoga Game by Kathy Beliveau. We will be adding a few more poses from this book into our practice each week. You can see a little peek into how this book works in the image below:

Finally, it was time to start cooling down. This week we learned a song by Lianne Bassin called "Love Inside My Heart" which actually presents a kid-friendly version of a loving kindness meditation. We find all of the love that we have inside of ourselves and we send it first to ourselves, then to those closest to us, and then out into the whole world. Lianne Bassin's CD of mindfulness music for children called Breathe In will be released on June 20. I can't wait!

We continued cooling down with a reading of The Peace Book by Todd Parr. Then it was time for the most important part of Yoga Storytime, the time when we rest. We took a brief svasana together; isn't it amazing that they will rest like this! It was very brief today, but each week we will add a little more time to our rest. When we sat back up we stayed in our circle to sing farewell to one another, just like we sang welcome to one another in the beginning of our class. 

I hope you had a beautiful rest of your day and that you continue to have a wonderful week. Thank you for letting me play yoga with you for a little while today! I can't wait to see you again next week. Until then, NAMASTE!