Importance of Classroom Management for Kids Yoga Teachers

Hiring a good kids yoga teacher isn’t easy, according to kids yoga teacher and employer Antoniette Finelli of www.yogarocks.ca. She’s a specialist in yoga for kids on the lookout for teachers who can deliver a great class. In fact, she’s made a business out of it.

So what is Yoga Rocks looking for in a teacher? I’ll let this excerpt from the Yoga Rocks Job Posting speak for itself:

Experience with kids is key.

Understanding the dynamics of a classroom or group of kids is also very important.

Being able to adjust your teaching style or lesson plan on the fly is also key!!

Having a kids yoga teaching degree is not key, being able to manage kids and have fun at the same time is.

Having A Kids Yoga Teaching Degree Is Not Key

When I talked to Anoniette about her want-ad, she emphasized that she needs someone who can get the kids to listen. The best candidates she finds are those with experience in summer camps or gymnastics. She needs teachers who can take command of a group of kids, teachers who aren’t afraid of being strict.

Classroom Management Is A Skill That You Can Only Get Through Experience

Obviously the class has to be fun, but Finelli says many of those applying are scared of the kids so their classes turn to mayhem. Some new teachers think it’s rude to be strict. What they don’t know is if they can’t lead the class they’ll never get to the fun stuff, the challenging poses, that kids love. Finelli says, “You can’t teach the tough poses that kids get excited about, unless the kids can sit and listen and watch.”

When Yoga Rocks looks for new teachers they emphasize in the job posting:

Tell us why you would be great for this job, and what you could bring to it. Not about your training or that you know how to lesson plan!!

Yoga Rocks pays a respectable $45/class, still Finelli is on the lookout for qualified teachers. It’s her reputation on the line if she sends in a teacher and the school rejects them.

3 Classroom Management Tips

Here are some Classroom Management tips from Finelli:

Tools: Use tools, like a bell, to give the kids something to focus on. One game she plays with the kids is to focus on the sound of the bell for 3 rings, when the bell stops you can open your eyes. (Aruna’s note: I tried this game with my preschool kids last week. One of the school teachers turned to the other and said, “We need to get a bell.” It works.)
Set the Expectation of listening: Finelli counts down from ten to one. During this time everyone knows they must find a way to quiet down. Finelli usually gets everyone quite by the time she gets to six.
Get experience with kids: don’t think that because you teach adults yoga you’ll be able to cross-over. With kids you need to be able to re-direct a situation really quickly, something that doesn’t happen in an adult class. Don’t be afraid of the kids, be their teacher.

Can You Take Charge of a Full Classroom?

If you are wondering if you’ve got what it takes to teach kids, you probably don’t. At least not yet.

You know it when you can teach a large class and have fun doing it. In Young Yoga Masters, we call it your Teacher Personality, and we offer people the opportunity to shadow kids classes. If you haven’t developed your teacher personality, consider volunteering with real children, the bigger the groups the better. Volunteer until you know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that you can lead a class.

Then give Yoga Rocks a call and help them show kids why yoga rocks!

Thanks to Antoniette Finelli for her valuable input for this blog post.

For readers: Do you think you will know you have classroom management skills when you get them? What do you do?

A Short Story of One Successful Switch to becoming a Kids Yoga

Let’s all agree that we understand how great yoga and meditation are.

Also that we wish it was something we had learned at a young age.

And what a difference yoga and meditation can make in a life.

I’m going to assume that everyone agrees that teaching yoga to kids is not only personally rewarding, but a really useful foundation for young leaders of the future. I’ll even go so far as to say its a most solid foundation on which to build a Vision for your life.

So let’s open up the topic of how to start teaching kids yoga classes so we can spread these important tools.

Insider Information on the Business of Kids yoga I Found out the Hard Way

First you should know this is something I learned myself by doing. I didn’t study business in University (I studied Political Science!). When I started off there weren’t that many people offering kids yoga. I only knew of 3 or 4 other teachers in my city of almost three million people.

Many yoga teachers go back to their jobs or end up teaching part-time after a few months or years of becoming a teacher. When I first thought of being a yoga teacher I didn’t know if I could make it so that I wouldn’t have to go back to “work.”

Would I be a Good Kids Yoga Teacher?

I also questioned whether I could be a good kids yoga teacher. I had some babysitting skills, but never worked with groups of kids. My first class of kids nearly ate me for dinner!

With some training, a lot of guidance, and a heap of trial and error, I overcame the obstacles. I started teaching kids yoga in 1998. Since then, I’ve only taken jobs that would help me get skills and experience to help me teach and promote yoga.

Before I started doing teacher training, all of my classes were children’s yoga except for two adult classes.

Plus No More Working on Weekends!

If you’ve been teaching yoga classes you may also be surprised to hear I only teach two evenings a week, and I don’t work on weekends (except when I offer a special workshops)! This still amazes me since my first few years teaching were all evenings and weekends. It felt like I could never go out with my friends and family because I was always teaching a class when they were getting together.

The next few posts I’ll let you know the easiest ways to make the transition from a “regular job” to teaching yoga to teaching kids yoga.

You can do it! Bring Yoga to Kids and Feel the Joy

If you want to teach kids, you can do it with a little know-how and a lot of determination. You will connect with children and let children connect with you. The rewards are worth the effort!

The next group of posts will include some important factors for your success:

Making the transition from adult to kids yoga
how to find a good kids yoga teacher training program
social networking tools to get new kids classes
cold-calling to get new kids classes
how to write a good advertisement
what you can charge for a kids yoga class
keeping your classes once you’ve got them
when to quit your job and become a teacher

Please leave a comment on what you would like to see first. Feel free to add any other topics that will help you start teaching kids yoga.

The more kids yoga we teach – the better it will be for all of us!

getting a job