Exploring Our Backbone (K-2nd Grades)

What a pleasure to teach the second Mind Move Make class for our K-2nd grade students!  When we made our way to the classroom, everyone remembered exactly what to do before entering.  Each child carefully took his or her shoes off and put all belongings on a hook outside the classroom, ready to gather together at the end of our time together.

After each child carefully selected a yoga mat, we were ready to begin!  We started the class by talking about and experiencing the difference between a calm body and a not-calm body.  First I asked the children to show me a not-calm body.  When I gave the signal, everyone dissolved into fun fits of wiggles, jiggles, and chaotic movement!  Though as soon as I gave the signal to stop, each child froze in place and a silence engulfed the classroom.  Then we experimented with a calm body.  I asked the students to be aware of their breath, breathing in as if smelling flowers and breathing out as if blowing out birthday candles.  What a stark difference between calm and not-calm bodies!  We will continue to explore this throughout Session 1.

After that we once again read I Am Yoga.  Since the students were familiar with the poses from looking at and moving with the book last week, we went a little faster.  It was amazing how much they remembered!  I asked them to pay attention, especially to the pose and phrase they chose to illustrate from our last class.

When we completed the last yoga pose I asked the students to feel up and down the middle of their own backs, first with their backs straight, then with their backs bent.  "What is that bumpy thing that you feel running up and down your back?" I asked.  Several students raised their hands, and we decided it is our backbone, or vertebrae.  I explained that the vertebrae supports half the weight of our entire body, and each bone stacks one on top of the other like building blocks.  Yoga is GREAT for our backbones because it allows our backbones to move in many different ways!

Then it was time for everyone to finish the artworks that we started the previous week.  Many students still needed to complete the drawing using markers, but some were ready to begin adding color!  We used oil pastel and watercolor paint to add color the the images.  I demonstrated a resist technique in which the oil from the pastels resists the watercolor and shows up beautifully bright against the paint.

Here are the student's finished artworks, along with the phrases they chose to illustrate from I Am Yoga.