Pose of the Week - Savasana

Savasana, also called Corpse pose, is the last pose in a yoga class, and often considered the most important.  It is intended as a meditative pose, giving time to relax and completely let go.  It is very difficult for kids to settle in to savasana.  A typical savasana in an adult class can last from 5-10 minutes.  Kids have a much shorter attention span and often get the wiggles, so I often play games to work them into savasana and get them to stay a little longer, working on breathing and relaxing.  I will talk about these in another post - today is just the basics.

To get in to savasana, come down to your back, legs about mat length apart, arms spread a little wider than the body, palms facing up.  Close your eyes and focus on breathing.  When a thought comes into your head, acknowledge it, and then let it go.  The goal here is to quiet the mind and relax, and this is very difficult!

I also like to include a nice massage with savasana, which I will demonstrate in a later post.  This aides in relaxation.  We take this a little further in my autism group.  A lot of people with autism have an under-stimulated nervous system and are constantly seeking sensory input.  Some people with this symptom respond well to deep pressure and joint compression.  Throughout our classes, Kobi has decided he enjoys his savasana more on his belly.  To facilitate bonding between him and his mom, rather than me give the massage and pressure, his mom would provide it for him at the end of class.  He really seemed to enjoy this time.  Here are some pictures of his mom giving him deep pressure massage in savasana.

 

Pose of the Week

Our pose of the week, Navasana or Boat Pose, is one that is great for building core stability and strength.  It can be very difficult for children (and adults) with low muscle tone to get into this pose.  We start by grounding our bottoms down and sitting up nice and tall with bent knees, the bottoms of our feet on the mat.  Then, we put our hands on our knees or shins and rock back so our feet are off the mat.
At this point, you can extend your legs into "tabletop" - knees bent, calves parallel to the ground, feet together.  You can release your hands and reach them toward your feet.  Here's us getting started with the pose:

If you would like a further challenge, the full pose is extending the legs out straight, keeping your core muscles engaged and legs and feet together.  Your body should form a V-shape.  Here I'm helping Mercedes keep her upper body off the mat - it's quite tempting to just lay down and lift your legs up, but that's not really working the core muscles. ;)

Here's Mercedes's succesful Boat Pose - with kids, they may not do the full pose with correct alignment, but that's ok, as long as they are having fun and are being safe.

And, if you need a little extra support, you can do like Mercedes does and find some furniture to prop your head up. ;)

Pose of the Week

Thanks to my fabulous model Mercedes, I will be attempting to post a Pose of the Week on a (hopefully) weekly basis!  This week's pose is a very simple cross-legged comfortable seated position.  In my kids yoga classes, when it's time to listen, we all come to a comfortable sitting position.  In school, I call it "criss cross applesauce."  This pose is a grounding pose and helps the children focus.  We also sit in this position when we do breathing exercises.

To get into this simple pose, we ground our bottoms to the mat and bend our knees, crossing one leg on top of the other.  It's important to practice good posture, as a lot of the students I work with have low muscle tone - this can lead to breathing problems and back problems down the road.  We reach the top of our heads toward the ceiling and practice shrugging our shoulders up to our ears and then rolling our shoulders back and down a few times before finally settling into the pose.  To get class started, I also like to do a few audible exhales - we breathe in deeply through our noses, then breathe out loudly through our mouths.  Here's Mercedes having some fun with this:

Dressed to Impress

One of the kids in my yoga and autism group at Touchstone is named Kobi.  Kobi really likes the other girl in our class named Lilly.  At our second class, Kobi showed up wearing, I kid you not, an awesome pin-stripe SUIT.  Not stretchy yoga clothes, but a suit.  He was ready to impress Lilly.  He even brought a little Happy Meal toy to give her as a gift.  Unfortunately, as life goes, there was a change in the routine – Lilly was really sick and couldn’t make it to class.

Naturally, Kobi got pretty upset.  One characteristic of autism is the inability to be flexible with a routine or schedule, and Lilly being absent definitely threw off his routine.  He started screaming and crying, telling us that this was not fair and that Lilly had to come.  His mom said that he had been having a very rough week, and once he started going, he probably would not stop for the rest of the evening.

As Kobi ripped off his jacket and shoes and walked down the hallway screaming, his mom had to excuse herself for a breather.  Myself and Elizabeth, who works for Touchstone, worked on trying to calm him down.  We were ultimately successful with having Kobi use a cell phone to take pictures of his suit and toys he brought for Lilly, and then send them to her mom.  After about half an hour, he was under control, and I asked him if he was ready for yoga.  He right away ran out to get his mom, tell her he was ready for yoga, and help me set the yoga mats up.

Although he was pretty upset with the change in routine, he was ultimately able to calm himself down and really enjoy the (shortened) yoga practice.  I brought a Tibetan singing bowl with me, which if you haven’t heard, sounds really cool and is also very relaxing.  He really enjoyed making the bowl “sing” at the beginning and end of our class. 

It was awesome to see the stress and anxiety leave his mom as he got settled in and really enjoyed the rest of class.  We did a few activities that allowed him to stretch and balance with his mom, hopefully helping to ease some of the tension.

At the end of the first class, I gave them some “homework” – working on a breathing exercise at home.  Although he had been having a rough week, he did say that he worked on his breathing.  His mom said she was also working on her breathing to calm herself when Kobi was having a breakdown.  Once he even told her she was “breathing too loud.”  She also said that he was very excited to show children in another one of his therapy groups what he had learned in yoga class.  Hopefully his excitement for yoga continues and he is able to use what he learns both as coping strategies and ways to relate to other kids!