safety

The Dangers of Kids Yoga at Halloween

Halloween is a favorite holiday, especially for kids, but it can also be a dangerous time in ways you may not expect. Here are a few timely words of wisdom from an experienced yoga teacher to make your Halloween Yoga a little more safe.

3 Dangers of Doing Kids Yoga at Halloween

a yoga teacher is teaching kids on Halloween and all the children are wearing costumes — Look at All These Costumes in Kids Yoga Class!

Kids Doing Yoga in Costumes: all the big frilly princess skirts, the pitchforks and the plastic pumpkins can be a real obstacle to yoga poses. Stretch carefully on your yoga adventures or someone may lose an eye for real.

Over the Top Excitement – Halloween is so much fun, sometimes its too fun. This means bedtimes get missed, nappers don’t nap, and cranky kids fill the streets with real screaming and complaining. Both parents and kids can be so jacked up on candy they can’t fall asleep which can throw off your routine for days. If that’s the case you may want to try these bedtime tips here.

Barf – In a word, barf. It is a danger I have personally experienced when teaching kids yoga. It happened after a sugary birthday cake, but Halloween candy can cause the same result. You could end up with a big puddle of vomit, a real smelly ghost for the rest of your class. Not to mention its a slippery hazard. I strongly suggest saving the Halloween candy for after the forward bends and inverted poses. Even better, give out stickers and Halloween Colouring Pages like the ones in these posts and skip the upset stomachs all together.

If you think I should dress up as Scrooge, the cold-hearted complainer, for Halloween, you’ll be happy to know I keep the complaining on my blog and out of Kids Yoga. I really do like Halloween, I just know from experience it has real dangers amidst all the fun.

So keep your scares the pretend variety and have a safe and happy Halloween.

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3 Hard-to-Teach Kids Yoga Poses

This post is a free sneak peak at the Kids Yoga Teacher Training I offer at Young Yoga Masters. You can get many more tools like this by joining me for one of the upcoming fall courses. I’d love to see you there. Click here for full details.

An important part of the kids yoga teacher training is finding out what doesn’t work in kid’s yoga BEFORE you are with the kids. You’ve got to know age-appropriate poses, how to teach them, and how to time your classes. Too many hard-to-teach poses can lead to frustrated, injured, or tuned out kids.

“Hard” means “Time Consuming”
For instance, these three poses can be hard to teach to kids. Perhaps “hard” isn’t the best word, lengthy-to-teach may describe it better. It doesn’t mean I don’t teach them. It also doesn’t mean kids don’t like them. In fact I do teach them and kids do like them – a lot! Certain poses just require more time and energy.

I DO NOT recommend introducing all three of these poses in one class. Here’s why:

catpose — Cat Pose turns into Downward Dog

Cat/Cow Pose: usually ends up being Downward Dog/Cow pose. Hard-to-teach because no matter what you say, about 25% of the class doesn’t get the part about keeping your knees on the floor. By the time you’ve helped the 15th child figure out the pose, the first children have been doing the pose for a long time or have tuned out.
Wheel Pose (variation)- also called 1/2 Wheel and Bridge
Wheel: The kids who can do wheel pose love it – and ask for it! So if kids ask for it, don’t give in right away. Often 50% of older kids can’t do it. Wheel pose takes a heap of arm and abdominal strength plus flexibility. This can’t be taught in one class. If you start off with wheel, you’ll have half the class watching on in awe, but unable to do it. Then they feel inadequate doing an alternate pose. Most pre-school kids can’t do wheel at all! If kids ask for wheel, start off teaching the poses that build up to wheel, like table, bow, and camel pose. Then offer up wheel to try at the end of class for a short time – the kid’s who can’t do wheel, after all those other poses, will be too tired to care.
Donkey Kicks
Donkey Kicks: kid’s love donkey kicks, but you’ve got to warn them about NOT FLIPPING OVER! Sometimes kids get so excited they really go for it. And then there’s the problem of KIDS GETTING KICKED. With Donkey Kicks the teacher must be up and walking around – to serve and protect.

Sometimes when we’ve been doing yoga for a while we forget which poses are beginner, intermediate, and advanced. Introduce yoga to kids with beginner poses, then sprinkle in the hard-to-teach poses. Those poses will feel much more satisfying when there aren’t too many.

Do you have any tricks for teaching these hard-to-teach poses?

Do you find any poses hard-to-teach?

5 Potential Life Saving Summer Safety Tips That Should Not be Ignored

watersafety — Practice Water Safety - Wear a Life Jacket!

Yesterday I was saddened by some tragic news at the daycare where I teach yoga. They were grieving three recent deaths in the community. These occurred in two separate incidents outside of the daycare – but all involved drowning.

A three year old boy drowned at home when he wandered off and fell in the pool. He was a student at the daycare. The shock and sadness still lingers in his classroom.

The other involved the uncle and cousin of a school age student. They drowned in a lake while playing in the water. The uncle tried to save his son who started drowning when the lake dropped off and suddenly got deep.

In the last week there have been ten drowning deaths in Ontario, of these seven were children or teens. Regardless of where you are – education is the key to safety. Today, to honor our dear friends at the daycare we are going to take time out for some safety reminders.

5 Potential Life Saving Summer Safety Tips That Should Not be Ignored

Water Safety: It only takes seconds to minutes to drown in water. If children can’t swim they should wear life jackets in any water that can get deep. Kids who are going to around water regularly should take swimming lessons so they practice how to breath and move in the water.
Life Jackets: Everyone in a boat should wear a life jacket. Especially if you are boating with kids. Three of the deaths in Ontario occurred when a father, who wasn’t wearing a life jacket, drowned. Eventually his two kids, who were wearing life jackets, drowned as well.
Child-proof Doors and Windows: Homes with infants and toddlers must be child-proofed. This includes always locking doors and windows to dangerous areas like pools or balconies.
Back in when you park your car: The police here recommend this simple tip to help prevent accidentally hitting small children when backing out of a driveway. You’ll have a good view of what is going on to safely back in and park. When you are leaving – you drive forward with a good view. Back in to park then forward out when you leave. Think about doing this when you park at a school or daycare or any homes with kids around.
First Aid: Take first aid and CPR training and have a first aid kit. When accidents can’t be prevented, you may know something that could save a life!

Pause Now for Safety
Please pause for a minute right now and think of any situations recently when you have wondered if your kids and you are safe.

Now think of what you can do to still have fun but also play it safe. Can you change a routine or habit that would make more sense in terms of safety?

We will miss our dear friends and relatives at the daycare. We can also learn from the mistakes and stories of others so that we don’t make the same mistakes. Let’s all take a moment to reflect on our own intuition and feelings about improving our safety.

I’d love to hear any other safety tips you can offer that may help us all be more safe.

3 Simple Health Tips for Kids Yoga Teachers

Recently I’ve been feeling the excitement, perhaps the over-excitement, of life. With so many things on the go I got run down and decided to stop everything for awhile to get back to a healthy state. My Mentor, Tulshi Sen, always said that when things get overwhelming it’s time to stop everything and re-connect with your hearts desire.

These wise words have guided me through some intense times although when I first heard them I didn’t believe I could stop EVERYTHING. I now know that only by stopping can I change track both physically and emotionally.

Stopping got me thinking about how important it is for us to take care of ourselves as teachers. If we get sick or run down we can’t do what we love to do – teach. If we don’t acknowledge we’re sick and keep teaching, we spread sickness around instead of happiness.

By stopping, I saw I was getting robotic, completing tasks without experiencing any joy in doing them. I missed the signs of not eating well or not getting a good night’s sleep.

When I rested I realized three tips that were missing from the Health and Safety part of my Kids Yoga Teacher Training Curriculum. They help us stay healthy as teachers. These three simple health tips remind us to slow down, examine our habits, and sometimes stop altogether so we can do what we love:

Wash Your Hands Between Classes
Recently a child I teach ended up in hospital for a week with a virus. If you teach multiple classes in a day you may be carrying a virus around from class to class. Slow down so you can wash your hands after each class. You’ll help stop the spread of illness from one class to the next and also to yourself.
Sleeve Cough/Sneeze
When I was a kid we were taught to cover our mouth with our hand when we coughed or sneezed. That habit was so deeply ingrained in me it took months to change – even though it was obvious just how germ-y our hands and everything we touch will become if we cough into them.

The new etiquette: if you don’t have a tissue sneeze into your sleeve rather than your hand. This keeps your hands clean for when you touch other things like your yoga props or the children. Hopefully you know about this one, but I still see people covering their mouth with their hand – probably out of habit. Teach this to the children you see sneezing in your class as well and everyone will stay healthier!
If you are Sick – It’s time to Stop
Teaching yoga is important but if you are sick it is a time to stop what you are doing and reconnect with what is important. If it means canceling a class then cancel it. I know it is hard to do, especially if you are self-employed, but it is worth it. What amount of money is more important than good health?

Yoga and meditation help us become the Masters of our Destiny. When we get run down we forget the power we have to change our lives. Stopping helps us realize that we don’t HAVE TO do the things that are causing us to be run down. The only thing we have to do is give ourselves the freedom to live a happy and healthy life.

Shocking Facts of First Aid

Do You Know First Aid?

Yesterday I finished my First Aid and CPR (Cardio Pulmonary Resuscitation) training so I feel like shocking everyone – because now I can handle it.

The course was taught by Jim Beck of EMS and he did a great job of keeping the information relevant and fresh. That’s him in the picture saving a baby. He’s so good at it, that’s why he looks so calm.

Actually, these are the practice babies we used so we can help all ages. The shocking fact is that children can be saved by CPR more than adults because it is not usually related to a heart attack. As long as CPR is performed right away.

A couple of stories about First Aid; one that happened to me in a kids yoga class and another a parent told me about from a yoga birthday party.

but first an….

Important Notice
This week as you go to your classes (adult or children) take note of where they keep their first aid kit. Unfortunately I learned this the hard way when one child got a nose bleed (see below). The whole incident would have been much easier if I had used the First Aid Kit hanging on the wall the whole time. I just didn’t realize it was there.

The Bloody Nose Incident:
With kids’ yoga accidents can happen quite easily. The teacher needs to keep watch of where kid’s feet are going to land and how close the kids are to each other. Prevention is key!

But sometimes kids’ noses start bleeding for no known reason.

This happened in my latest First Aid situation. My student came to me with blood coming out of her nose, all over her hand, and there was also a trail of blood on the floor behind her. She said she often gets nosebleeds.

What would you do?
Fortunately it was at the community centre with another staff around so I sent one of the older kids to bring another staff for backup. I brought the child (7 years old) to the sink in the room and since I didn’t have gloves, I gave her the paper towel to hold under her nose. Then got her to pinch her own nose just below the bone and lean forward. The nosebleed stopped in a couple of minutes.

However, the room is now “contaminated” by the blood on the floor. So all the kids needed to leave the room. There was actually only 5 minutes left so parents were arriving already. We ended the class early.

The girl’s father was informed when he arrived and the necessary incident reports filled out.

Wearing gloves, the floor was cleaned with diluted bleach.

It all went pretty smoothly, although one of the staff wanted her to tilt her head back. According to First Aid, tilting forward is the recommended way so the blood can drain out. So with that in mind it really wasn’t a big deal.

Which brings me to the next incident:

Incident 2: The Yoga Birthday Party
This incident I wasn’t there for, but it is worth noting because a lot can be learned from this.

A parent told me her daughter was at a yoga birthday party and they were all learning crane pose, balancing the body on the hands.

One little girl at the party lost her balance, falling forward and planting her face into the ground. The result – 2 teeth lost.

First, according to my first aid course there are some conditions where the tooth can be re-inserted and it will re-attach on its own. So this is where first aid can really pay off.

Second, be careful with the balancing poses! Use mats for these. I like to stick to standing poses like tree or airplane, or sitting balancing as in Kundalini Lotus pose (see below).

I avoid poses like crane and headstand. If you are going to do them, use one-on-one supervision to start with.

Kids can be very fearless and not aware of the dangers of each pose so clearly the best it to prevent accidents from happening at all.

Also consider arming yourself with first aid training too.

safety

3 Dangers of Doing Kids Yoga at Halloween

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