You don’t need to travel far to go on a family adventure – only to your living room! Here’s a step-by-step guide to creating a fun 15-minute kids yoga experience the whole family will love.
Step by Step Guide to Kids Yoga
Theme. Pick a specific topic or storybook that you’d like to create your Family Yoga experience around. For example, let’s pretend that you are going to the Zoo.
Brainstorm. Get out a big piece of blank paper and markers. List all the animals, people, and things that you would see, hear, and do on this topic. Record everyone’s ideas.
Set-up. Clear the space where you would like to do your Family Yoga experience together. Ensure that it is a safe environment and that you all have plenty of room to move around. Some great spots are a room in your house, outdoors in the park, or in your campsite. Explain the purpose of the activity, how long it will take (10-20 minutes is great to start), your expectations of their behavior, any safety considerations, and that creativity is encouraged.
Warm-up. Get the whole family moving and stretching to wake up your bodies in preparation for the experience. Sun Salutes are a great way to get started.
Stretch up like a giraffe, fold forward like a waterfall, step back like a bear, your hands and knees like a jaguar, and curl up like a mouse. Do again in reverse, and repeat.
Journey. Now that your bodies are warmed up, it’s time to go on your pretend Family Yoga journey.
For your Zoo journey, first pretend to pack your bags in preparation for the day. Then, pretend to get into a car (or train or plane) to travel to the Zoo. Next, pretend to walk around the zoo. Call out the animals that you see and act them out altogether, one at a time.
You might see an
- eagle (perch on a tree)
- lion (on hands and knees)
- elephant(arms as a trunk)
- monkey (squat down)
- kangaroo (hop with paw hands)
You could pretend to stop for ice cream or anything else that you think would be fun for the day.
Use your imagination on what you would see, hear, and do on your Zoo visit.
Rest. Once you have finished your Family Yoga experience, it’s important to take the time to relax your mind and body. For our Zoo trip, pretend to be sea stars. Lie on your back. Stretch out your arms and legs. Relax.; Breathe deeply.
Discuss. Talk about your Family Yoga experience afterward. What did everyone like best? Encourage a discussion. Ignite their excitement. Connect with each other through the fun of movement and storytelling.
Share. Practice the Family Yoga trip together another day. Invite friends and family over to share in the fun. Take photos and make a little “Family Yoga” book.
Tips for a successful Family Yoga experience:
- Focus on fun – children’s yoga is less formal than adult yoga, emphasizing movement and creativity rather than practicing the poses with perfect alignment
- Pretend to travel to different places in the world and use the experience as a way to learn about different cultures
- Laugh and have fun – if the timing isn’t right, then try again another day
- Get everyone involved and acknowledge everyone’s abilities
- Encourage everyone’s creativity – for example, ask the children how they think that the bear moves
- Just like a storybook, have a beginning (warm-up), middle (journey), and end (rest)
- Be safe
- Research and learn new yoga poses each time that you practice your Family Yoga experience together (ex. Downward Facing Dog, Mountain Pose, Plank Pose, Child’s Pose, Triangle Pose)
- Remain in the Resting Pose for a period of time to teach your children how to de-stress and relax
- Bring awareness to their breath
- Use props or visuals to get the family in the mood for their topic (ex. Bring out your stuffed animals for your Zoo adventure)
- Play music that compliments your topic
- Enjoy yourself – remember your enthusiasm is contagious
- Be in the moment – put all your worries and work aside and be present with your children – that’s where the magic begins …
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I’d love to hear about your Family Yoga experience, please email me at giselle(at)kidsyogastories (dot)com. Check out our yoga-inspired books at Kids Yoga Stories. Read about the benefits of storytelling and yoga.
Giselle Shardlow is a children’s author of Kids Yoga Stories. She hopes to inspire children by drawing from her experiences as an international primary school teacher, yoga teacher training graduate, world traveler, mother, and yogi. Her yoga-inspired children’s books and other creative resources can be found at www.kidsyogastories.com.
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We just got a set of yoga cards with family poses to do together and are enjoying trying a few new ones each week. I love yoga myself – it's just trying to get my daughter to understand that it's a slow activity and not 'go quickly and move to the next' 😉
That sounds nice – may I ask
1. Where did you get the cards and do you like them and
2. How are you getting your kids to slow down??? Mine are all action and not all slow and I would love to hear your thoughts!
Amanda
Thank you for giving tips. I and my family members do yoga regularly. We are having an nice experience by doing yoga.
–Fabrizio Neves
These are some practicable tips which can be helpful for me to motivate my family for having daily yoga exercises. I hope that my whole family will have a satisfactory fitness with the help of it.
These all tips are good for us. We can improve our yoga performance through these instructions. I will definitely try it.
This is so nice! Using yoga to have a tighter family bonding 🙂 Yoga Articles