Mini Yogis and Moms… Doing Yoga Together
When you think of Yoga for kids can you picture a group of 1 to 2 year olds doing down dog and tree pose?
One of the age groups we have been working with are toddlers from 2 to 4 years old. However, we have a few children that have not yet celebrated their 2nd birthday who love participating in our Yoga classes. So we decided to separate our Mini Yogis into 2 subgroups – children 21 months to almost 3 years old and 3 to 4 year olds – and it has worked out so much better!
At the beginning we decided to ask the moms to leave the kids in the studio while they waited in the reception area. There were some kids who did not have a problem doing the class on their own. However, there were others, especially the youngest ones, who expressed the need to have their mother or caregiver by their side since it resulted in a difficult task to keep the routine of the class because they constantly went out in search of them.
After a few classes we decided to invite the moms and caregivers to participate in the class. They shared a mat with their little yogi or yogini and did all the motions and exercises with them. This seemed to work out great for the younger kids; however, the 3 and 4 year olds all of a sudden also wanted their mommies in the class with them even though they had been doing a great job independently.
This is when we decided that it would be best to separate Mini Yogis into 2 subgroups. Once we made this change we noticed that all the children seemed much happier! The youngest group really enjoyed sharing Yoga class with their mommies and the Moms were also very excited to be able to do a little bit of Yoga while sharing a special moment with their little ones. The older group was once again able to feel comfortable and happy doing Yoga with the other little yogis and yoginis in the class.
