Instructor: Bijoli Biswas
Class: Morning Focus Group, 30-40 Minutes
Community: Mixed ages, Grades K-5
Plan Creation Date: April 15, 2010
Yoga Calm Principle/Lesson Goal: Stillness
Lesson Plan:
Calm
• Belly Breathing: Lying on backs, breathe into belly, focus on breath, eyes closed to calm and prepare for class. Focus your attention on how completely still your body can be except for the breath moving your belly up and down as your lungs slowly fill with air to expand and then slowly release the air.
• One Minute Exploration (card): Remember a time when you were playing hide and seek. Think of where you were and how you kept yourself from being seen. If you were going to hide in this room, where would you hide? Imagine being completely still so that no one can find you.
Activate
• Cat/Cow: Breath smoothly and slowly – equal durations of inhaling and exhaling breathe – exhale completely. Belly drops like a cow. Back rounds up like a cat. Synchronize breath and movement…breathe out as you move into cat…breath in and you move into cow.
• Floor Twist: Roll over onto back – pull knees up toward the chest, then over to the right and all the way to the floor – stretch arms out to the sides and look to the left, stretch your breath out to your fingertips – bring knees to the center – repeat on the left side.
• Flow Sun Salutation: Go through a flow including special emphasis and time in these positions: Mountain, Forward Bend, and Down Dog. Students explore stillness and activation together as you coach them to awareness of muscles activating, stretching and expanding.
• Calm Voice: Have a student lead breathing with the Hoberman Sphere. After five breaths students lie on their backs and take five more belly breaths by themselves with their eyes closed. Slowly read the sentences to them from the Calm Voice worksheet.
Students complete the calm voice worksheet silently and then share their responses.
Calm
• Guided Relaxation: Lie still on backs, eyes closed, rhythmic breath…Read, “Get Away” page 134 in Ready, Set, RELAX.