Yoga for Kids | Precious Moments Baby Massage and Yoga Lincoln

This month’s guest blog is from Liz at Precious Moments Baby Massage and Yoga. Today is International kid’s Yoga Day, so what better day to share with you all the benefits of doing yoga with your children!

I take my girls to yoga, and also practice it myself as I find it really helps to centre me no matter how my day went. But, enough about me – I leave you all to Liz!

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Lovely to “meet” you all and many thanks to Elora for inviting me to share with you a little bit of information about myself and the work I do at precious moments. With International Kid’s Yoga Day approaching (Friday 6^th April 2018), then more about my children’s yoga sessions seems well timed.

I started out my working life as a Nursery Nurse and as an auxiliary at the local hospital, I went on to train to be a children’s nurse and I worked within this field for many years at Sheffield Children’s Hospital and in Australia as well as Leeds General Infirmary on Children’s Intensive Care. I returned to Lincoln and qualified as a Health Visitor and worked in that role for a few years before becoming a mummy to my two little ones.

This is when Precious Moments was born, as a result of all that I had seen and learnt in my career, as well as my eldest child and me suffering some episodes of anxiety and using yoga to help us. I wanted to impact positively in some way on the lives of other children and their families and really make a difference to the outcomes of the children. I have seen a rise in children with anxiety and mental health illnesses, an increase in developmental delay and a change in how children’ develop, sadly a decrease in supporting services and a huge change in society and the lives of parents and families as they try to adapt to these changes. So I provide guidance, support and run classes that address all of this, in baby massage, baby yoga and the children’s yoga classes from birth to 12years

What is yoga for kids?

Yoga for kids uses imagination, interaction, and play to transform and expand traditional yoga practices and health benefits to also include creativity, self-expression, relationship building and self-esteem.

Why it matters

In today’s modern technological world, children and families are overstimulated as they strive to keep up with the fast-paced demands of our society. The little ones can also lead busy and often performance-orientated lives, and with this, they experience a lot of emotional and mental pressure. In addition, the nation, including our little ones, is under siege by obesity, stress and diseases like diabetes that stem from poor diet and lack of exercise.

They need a wholesome outlet to balance their lives, and yoga is the ideal way to naturally unwind and get physical activity at the same time. Yoga works both the mind and body, by combining strengthening and stretching poses with deep breathing and relaxation. It has been shown to helpprevent many conditions and challenges facing our youth and their families, such as diabetes, high blood pressure, cholesterol, obesity, and stress

How can yoga help children?

A vast body of evidence suggests the following benefits:

Through the breath, poses, creative movement and relaxation yoga can improve both physical and mental health of children. Yoga builds strength, improves flexibility, and enhances balance and focus. Along with breathing exercises and calming relaxation time yoga can help to develop resilience, reduce stress and alleviate anxiety. Children find more productive solutions to problems, develop self-awareness, become more creative, do better in school as yoga enhances intelligence, learning ability, memory, concentration which impacts on their academic achievement. Improved sleep has been reported in all of my classes from baby massage to children’s yoga.

 Yoga is non-competitive, fully inclusive and non-religious and is therefore suitable for all.

Yoga for classrooms.

Teachers today are finding children are struggling with the standard routine as they are unable to sit for the periods of time required in a school day, as well as struggling to focus and concentrate. Yoga lends itself very well to being taught in the classroom. Ideally you will have access to a fully qualified and accredited children’s yoga teacher, but there are some ways for teachers to provide yoga in schools. It should be noted that yoga for children is not taught in the same way as adults. Yoga for children is practised in a fun and dynamic way. There may also be contraindications for poses and breathing exercises depending on age. The schools I have worked in and am currently working in are seeing great results and benefits from the guided relaxations, breathing exercises, focus on listening and fun ways to use the yoga poses and the resources I have provided to continue in class without me too.

If you would like more information about the award winning sessions running in your area or you would like to introduce yoga to your school or preschool please contact Liz on 0771 5025834, visit the website, like and follow the Facebook page, or find me on Instagram. I look forward to helping you.