Yoga is for the kids

Students at Dillworth Elem, Yoga in Schools class

School’s out! So kids should be outside, playing in the summer sun, relaxing and rejuvenating from the last school year of learning, deepening understanding, doing homework and learning some more.
Summer is the perfect time for youth to balance all the mental activity of the school year with physical activity so often overlooked in our schools. Encouraging your children, nieces, nephews, friend’s children and neighborhood kids to play spud, parkour, kickball or tag will benefit them tremendously.

Promoting kids to take some yoga classes will do more than just increase their strength and make them sweat. Comprehensive research from long-term programs like Yoga Ed and Yoga in Schools, has proven the variety of physical, mental, emotional and social benefits to children (and adults alike).

Yoga in Schools class teaching Triangle at Dillworth Elementary

These benefits include:

Physical Fitness

• Kinesthetic awareness and control
• Increased strength, flexibility, balance and coordination
• Enhanced cardiovascular and circulatory health, relaxation and renewal
• Weight control

Mental Fitness

• Increased focus and concentration, critical thinking and creativity
• Development of visual, auditory, and kinesthetic intelligences
• Enhanced perseverance, confidence, respect and tolerance
• Raised levels of serotonin, epinephrine and dopamine, increasing happiness
• Unified the cognitive and motor regions of the brain, increasing synaptic connections

Studies of students with ADD/ADHD have shown:

• Decreased hyperactivity, impulsivity and anxiety, leading to higher IQ scores
• Increased self-control, attention spans, and spatial memory

Emotional Fitness

• Developed awareness and understanding of feelings
• Appropriate processing and expression of feelings
• More self-esteem, awareness of choices, stability and self-control
• Supportive self-care and stress management

Social Fitness

• Understanding of personal responsibility, one’s impact and contributions
• Respect for different perspectives and for the greater community
• Improved communication and conflict-resolution skills

Kids working together on partner poses

YOGA IN SCHOOLS
A Pittsburgh-based non-profit, Yoga in Schools, has been supporting youth yoga since 2005, exposing approximately 600 children to varying levels of programming. Their mission, taught through Phys.Ed. classes, summer school programs and in other manners, is to “inspire, educate, and support the development of emotional and physical fitness/wellness in children… (and to) build a sustainable model of wellness programming through non-traditional, non-competitive, yoga-inspired movement and breathing techniques to children…”
Confidence, deeper self-awareness, and flexibility in mind and body complement the esteemed benefit of greater school success through the program Joanne Spence, Executive Director, brings to urban Pittsburgh elementary students and teachers.

Each lesson incorporates the following four elements:
• Breathing exercises—to calm or to energize, to nourish and integrate the central nervous system
• Games/Activities—creative, systems-thinking based play to activate brain cells, improve mood and support non-competitive action
• Yoga Poses/Movements—grounding and invigorating the body and mind to dissipate tension, reduce stress and rebalance all systems of the body
• Time-in & Affirmations—time for self-reflection and whole brain processing to restore, recharge, and enhance learning more responsible ways of empowering the mind and body

Joanne Spence also leads trainings for yoga teachers, Phys.Ed teachers, parents or other interested individuals and teachers to be able to implement yoga curriculum to K-12th grade youth. Find out more about these local and destination trainings here.

WHERE to go for outdoor summer classes: (read here for self-care outdoor yoga tips)

Pittsburgh Park Conservancy:
Saturdays: 10-11, Schenley Plaza Lawn, free
Mondays: 12-1, Schenley Plaza Lawn, free

BYS Yoga:
Saturdays: 10:30-11:30am, sign-in at REI on the Southside, $5, bring your own mat
Sundays: 9-10am, Grandview Park on Mt. Washington, 5, bring your own mat

Yoga H’Om:
Saturdays: 10:45-11:45, Flint Grove, Settlers Cabin Park, $5 individual or $10 for families, bring your own mat

Toddler and preschool yoga classes will resume in the fall here:
Yoga Matrika

Practicing yoga will help kids perform better at those fun, outdoor, summertime games, without getting too competitive nor too angry if they are always the one ‘it’ during tag.

Enjoy!