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Yoga for elephants
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Yoga is great for kids. It helps to foster concentration and focus; builds physical fitness and can help nurture self-esteem. However, some of the principles and practices employed in yoga can be difficult to convey to children. Even the poses themselves can be a bit challenging to teach (believe me . . . I’ve attempted it!).
Once, in teaching a kids’ yoga class, I decided to add a bit of fun by holding a “tree pose” contest. Tree pose is a balancing pose in yoga. I figured it would be over fast. Twenty minutes later, I had more than one child still standing (on one foot)! I thought, “Wow. There’s got to be a better way.”
One of the greatest tools I’ve seen employed in introducing kids to yoga is to liken each pose to an animal’s behavior. After all, many yoga poses are named after animals (cat pose, dog pose, lion pose, fish pose, and so on). It’s fun to introduce yoga to children by having them mimic the actions of specific animals.
Along the same lines, there is a fabulous book that you can use to involve your small child in your yoga practice. It is entitled “Babar's Yoga for Elephants,” by Laurent De Brunhoff (Abrams, September 2006). Narrated by the famous Babar himself, the friendly elephant introduces kids to 15 common yoga poses in an easily relatable language that children can connect with.
For example, a passage from the book has Babar explaining, “I find wrapping my trunk around my feet helps to stretch.” How accessible for children to think of a yoga pose that way, versus a technical description of how to do a proper forward bend.
I’m not one to try to “sell” people on anything (except maybe trying yoga), but I own this book myself, and I treasure it. The illustrations are the classic Babar—the same Babar I knew when I was a kid. And the text always makes me giggle. So, what’s not to love?
If you’ve got a little one at home, I highly recommend this book. You can even get a used copy on amazon.com for less than the cost of shipping. Makes a great gift, as well.
So, that’s what I’ve got for you today. Go buy a copy and put a little sunshine into the life of someone you love (or yourself) today.
Enjoy!
Namaste (“The light within me bows to and honors the light within you.”),
Brianna Politzer Stevens
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Blogs: (follow my blog posts at http://twitter.com/briannapstevens)
Scuba blog for women: http://scuba.girlswhogodown.com
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Yoga classes: Sunday, 5:15-6:15 p.m. and Monday 12:00-1:00 p.m. at Castro Valley Yoga (http://www.cvyoga.com)
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