Fun Friday – Yoga

The kids were all a little wired for our Fun Friday program.  We ended up with 21 kids for 45 minutes in grades 1 – 4.  It’s only the second week of school, the weather was awesome, and it was Friday, so naturally the kids were bouncing off the walls.  We started by doing some jumping jacks, running in place and toe touches just to get out some of the energy.  And after we talked about yoga and some of the kids protested, I think we ended up having a great time.  It definitely wasn’t an easy group of kids, but we all survived and had fun.  We talked very briefly about yoga, did our warm-up and then began with sun salutations.  I normally do this at least 3 times with my story time crowd, but we were all still very rowdy so I think we maybe got through it twice.  After the sun salutations, I read a story from Storytime Yoga: Teaching Yoga to Children through Story, it’s an African tale about being patient.  The kids did a fairly good job listening to the story, then we acted out the story with yoga poses.  The kids really took to this idea and especially had a great time being the lion in the story.  I’m sure the other people in the building were a little concerned by the loud roaring from the programming space.  I ended up without having time to ask the kids about their favorite poses, but it’s a great idea to encourage the kids to remember some of the poses and to repeat them one last time before leaving.  We tried to do a short relaxation time, but a number of the kids were giggling and chatting with their neighbors, so it didn’t go very well, but I think everyone had fun (even the kids who weren’t too happy about the yoga in the first place).  The kids definitely need to move around, so I might try and find other ways to incorporate movement into our Fun Friday programs in the future.
Schedule:

• 1:55 – 2:00 – Hand out name tags
• 2:00 – 2:40 – Discussion & Read Aloud
• 2:40 – 2:45 – Snack

Information: Has anyone ever done yoga before?  What is yoga?
Read Aloud: Storytime Yoga: Teaching Yoga to Children through Story by Sydney Solis
Activity: Yoga Poses

• Namaste
• Warm-up
• Sun Salutations
  • Mountain Pose
  • Reach Up
  • Touch the floor
  • Flat back
  • Plank Pose
  • Cobra Pose
  • Downward Facing Dog
  • Flat Back
  • Touch Floor
  • Reach Up
  • Mountain Pose
• “The Lion’s Whisker” – Storytime Yoga – pg.49
  • Warrior I
  • Mountain
  • Half Moon Pose
  • Warrior II
  • Side Angle Pose
  • Pigeon Pose
  • Eagle Pose
  • Cobra Pose
  • Forward Standing Bend
  • Plank
  • Child’s Pose
  • Lion Pose
  • Boat
  • Bow Pose
  • Camel Pose
• Relaxation Series
  • Bridge Pose
  • Happy Baby Pose
  • Pull Right Knee to Chest
  • Pull Left Knee to Chest
  • Corpse Pose & Deep Breathing (Beanie Babies)
  • Meditation
  • Namaste
• Favorite Poses – What was your favorite pose we did today?