Instructor: Alyson Johnson
Community: Ages/Grades?, Classroom Setting, 1 hour
Plan Creation Date: November 15, 2013
Yoga Calm Principle/Lesson Goal: Listening
Academic/Social/Emotional Goal: Listen to your classmates, to your teachers, to yourself. A lot of people lack the skill of conversation these days, and listening is an important part of that. Theatre students are writing dialogue.
Props: Laminated Images (From the Portraits by Steve McCurry, 1997, Phaidon Press Limited) surrounding a vase of agates in water.
Music: Anjali CD, play out of laptop with speakers.
Lesson Plan:
Calm
- Mountain – Gather on the mats. Root down while standing in Mountain Pose, listen to your body as it becomes still.
- Volcano Breaths – Take 3 even volcano breaths. Make note of how your body is feeling, listening to your inner voice today.
Activate
- Forward Fold – Swam dove to forward fold.
- Flow – Step back to lunge-> plank, to floor -> Up dog, -> Down dog -> Lunge -> feet together, forward fold.
- Mountain – Roll up to stand in mountain, repeat. At the next forward fold, cross legs and come to seated.
- Twist – Seated twist on each side.
- Volcano breath – to center.
- Activity – Notice the pictures in the center of the room. Go ahead and get a picture that speaks to you, and bring it back to your mat.
- Sharing time – Find a partner. Choose one person to go first. Share about your picture, while the other person only listens. Why did you choose this image? What stood out to you? How does it make you feel? After one minute, we will switch listening and sharing. Have students share what they learned from their partner during sharing time. How did you remember what they said? How did it feel to just listen, without sharing your thoughts? How would this activity relate to life at school? At home? Place picture at top of mat.
- Mountain – Come from forward fold to stand in mountain.
- Eagle -> Star, using the image to focus upon. Listen to your body. What does it need for balance? What happens if we start talking during star pose? Do you lose focus? Switch sides.
- Forward fold -> Step back to lunge-> plank, to floor -> Up dog, -> Down dog -> Lunge -> feet together, forward fold.
Calm
- Relaxtion – Come to seated. Roll onto back. Rock out. Lay in relaxation pose.
- Breathing – Take 3 breaths together. Listen to your breath entering and exiting your body. Listen to your heart beating. Listen to the messages each of your senses are sending you. How did it feel when someone listened to you today in class? What did you do to be a good listener for your partner? Think of a time you listened to yourself. What was your inner voice telling you? Did listening to yourself help you? What can help you listen to your inner voice more often?
- Chime – Listen for the chime to end sounding before rolling over to right side. Peace in our thoughts, peace in our words, peace in our actions.