[currentuser role=”instructor_level”]
Instructor: Tanya Beard
Community: Preschool Ages, School Setting?, 30 minutes
Plan Creation Date: May 1, 2015
Yoga Calm Principle/Lesson Goal: Stillness
Lesson Plan:
Calm
- Short Intro – We move. People have movement in their bodies. Some have a little, some have a whole lot. Sometimes we need to be still. This is really hard. Can you think of a place or time when it helps to be very still? Come to the wall. Feel the wall. The wall is still. What if you were like the wall, what would that feel like, to have the stillness of the wall in your body? Today we will practice our stillness.
- Hoberman Breaths – with leader/counter. Compliments.
Activate
- Silent Wild and Freeze
- River Song Pose Flow (modified for preschoolers – I’m working with age 2 up to 4):
- Rock and Roll F/B Rock and Roll S/S Boat
- Star/Hug x 5 (w or w/out twinkle twinkle song)
- Mt Test
- Mt – Up Mt – Forw Bend – Down Dog / Wag, pant – Cobra / Stretch your neck forward pushing through the grass – Down Dog – Walk feet up Up Mt – Hands to Heart
- Warrior R – Warrior L – Mt – Up Mt
- Forw Bend – Down Dog – Cobra – Child’s Pose
Calm
- Yoga Flow – Hands to heart; upward mountain; forward bend – head heavy like a bowling ball; down dog; plank; cobra; child’s pose. Choose comfortable position.
- Peace Spray
- Sleepy Earth Story – Think about the early spring, when the Earth is still a little bit sleepy. It’s brown and moist from the rains and snow. Try to remember what the earth, the dirt smells like. Think about what it would feel like to squeeze some in your hand. It’s getting ready. Think about all the flowers, sleeping, waiting for the warm summer to return. Imagine you are a little seed, just waiting. Could read some from A Seed is Sleepy? Think about the little creatures and worms that might move through the soil, preparing it for the new roots that will reach down into the earth when the flowers come back to life. Think about what it might be like to be a small animal, cozy in a little burrow under the earth. Imagine yourself in that cool, cozy den, dark and quiet, far below the earth. All you have to do is sleep and wait.
Now, start to wiggle your toes, wiggle your fingers. Maybe you are a flower, maybe a vegetable, maybe a small creature in its burrow. Stretch and reach. Come to sitting, sit tall, and bring your hands to heart. - Dropping Acorns Game – (possible alternative to Sleepy Earth Story) – lift your hands – shake them out – really shake them – let them drop like acorns. Repeat for other body parts that are moving. (Except of course, head is laid back down gently.) “Let’s see if we can all be still together for the count of 10.”