Yoga for Children

Child Yoga

INTRODUCTION

 “We call a child's mind "small" simply by habit; perhaps it is larger than ours is, for it can take in almost anything without effort” (Christopher Morley). This is a quote once said by a great American writer named Christopher Morley. The power of a child’s mind is absolutely overlooked at times by adults. Many concepts in life are considered too mature or advanced for young children. For example: yoga for children. When yoga originated thousands of years ago, it is difficult to imagine that there was a specific type of yoga directed towards child practice. Yoga to some people probably is probably considered a practice for those who have grown old and wise and have been devoted throughout their lifetimes in Eastern cultures. The idea of becoming spiritually grounded and whole with oneself may be seen as being too mature for a child who is very young. Children could benefit from learning a lifestyle of yoga practices. In the past decade there has been a new interest in yoga solely for children in the United States but it has head primarily a medical focus. There are many benefits that are said to come from teaching children yoga at a very young age to help address or prevent behavioral or attention issues. Yoga can be more than just an exercise for children, but also a way of connecting them with their own minds just as it was originally intended. It can be a powerful tool to redirect and empower children in early ages but has seemed to fall into more of a profitable medical market than a lifestyle.

I work closely with children up to the age of 14 at my job at a tutoring center. The students there eat unhealthy, rarely exercise, and most likely have no connect to their spirituality. Many of the students come to the program I work at to get direction and guidance with their education. I believe that if these children could learn their own self-discipline and healthy habits, they would be more independent. This is why I started looking into yoga for children. I initially thought it could be good exercise for the students as an alternative for their physical education in school that they rarely participate in.  Further research made me think of the wide variety of intentions out there to get children to do yoga. This is a field I am particularly interested in when considering my future career. I have looked into many different methods to addressing child behavior issues during crucial years when development is key but have never thought of yoga as a possible option.

WESTERN FOCUS ON PHYSICAL HEALTH

Yoga in the West has nearly detached itself from its original spiritual roots. A group of researchers studying the benefits of yoga for children mention in their work, “Yoga, the oldest known system of personal development, emerged thousands of years ago from the Indian culture” (Berger, Silver, & Stein, 2009, p.36). Personal development is vital for children to thrive later on in life no matter what culture they live in but our society tends to push physical and academic development more than anything else. We all continue to develop throughout out lifetimes and yoga can be an aid during these processes. There is much debate on the exact origin of yoga but some would say is dates back to thousands of years ago. Today, there are advertisements all over North America for yoga directed at numerous populations, types of people, and even animals. This paper takes a look at one type of yoga that is focusing on a very specific population, which are children.

From a medical standpoint, getting young children interested in yoga could be considered a cultural advance in improving the health of children.  Many physical and emotional issues that people deal with throughout their lives are rooted in their child hood, which may be why practitioners can create an entire market out of child development.  There has been an incredible rise in businesses that are offering child yoga in the United States and also in the research being done to see how children can benefit physically from it.

Yoga focuses on balancing many different aspects of a person from their mind to their physical body. Research on yoga and children in the U.S. mostly focuses on specific medical benefits. Research done such as the study by Diamond (2012) focuses on medical phenomenon that occurs when yoga is practiced. She makes the argument, “Yoga has been found to improve not only the perception of stress but its physiological impact on the ANS, endocrine system, and the immune system” (Diamond, 2012, p. 19). In our culture, society expects scientific facts on how something benefits. The spirituality and lifestyle aspect is lost when facts like this are what are used to convince people to do yoga. Diamond (2012) also mentions, “We have only begun to scratch the surface on all the effects regular yoga practice can have, not only on the body by way of flexibility, strengthening, balance, and breathing, but on the mind and its impact at a cellular level, specifically our white blood cells and immune function” (p. 18). These are all aspects of physical health that are being pushed onto children in order to promote yoga. There is rarely mention of how a child can become more focused or one with themselves afterwards.

SELLING YOGA TO CHILDREN

Children are a complex market to for convincing. It is often difficult to convince children to do things because adults are telling them to. There has to be a strong appeal for children to agree to a new and usually foreign activity like yoga. One researcher studying relaxation elements for children mentions in his work, “Particularly, the integration of the movement oriented and experienced as well as the ‘exotic’ method of Yoga in the relaxation training proved to be especially effective” (Stueck & Gloeckner 2005, p. 376). This research was done to see how involved children would get in yoga. The idea was that if you offered children something new that they were not used to, they would be more inclined to get involved. I think this may work for some children but scare away others.

For young children with anxiety, trying something new and foreign would just increase this anxiety. The trick then would be to get the kids involved in the first place. Researchers are currently studying ways to get young kids involved and one experiment done by Clane, Mitchell and Engelman (1980) approaches children by asking them to volunteer instead of attending their usual physical education classes. They state, “The voluntary treatment program reinforced participation in the awareness and yoga exercises resulting in enthusiastic involvement in a new physical activity”(p.84). The kids involved in this study mention that they were uninterested in their regular physical education classes and many did not even want to attend them. When yoga was offered as an alternative, they were more than willing to participate so that they did not have to go to the regular classes. This may be an option of how to get children in many different school systems into yoga. If you give them the alternative to something they do not already like, they are more likely to join in. If yoga were in school systems, there would be less room for profits from it and more chance of children implementing it into their lifestyles.

With children who are going through crucial developmental stages, personal preferences become huge factors in what they are wiling to participate in and what they do not want to. This would play a huge role in how to get children involved in yoga. Some researchers argue that it would be best to include it in daily classroom curriculums so that a wide variety of children are involved. Others may need to have smaller, more direct instructed classes in order for the children to benefit from them. Written in the journal of Pediatric Nursing (2009), one author writes, “Children between 5 and 11 years of age may be taught together, but 10 to 11-year-old children may not want to share a class with younger children. By 11 years of age, children may also desire single gender classes.” (White 2009, p. 283). This adds complexity as to how to get children in yoga classes. There could be a widespread benefit if yoga were to be implemented into classrooms just as physical education is. Another researcher mentions, “This intervention has the potential to be implemented not only in small groups in the school psychologist's office but also with an entire classroom” (Peck, Kehle,, Bray, & Theodore,  2005, p.422).

            The idea of putting yoga in a classroom setting may not go over well with some educators due to . However, I see that this would be nothing but beneficial for a classroom of young children. They would be able to focus more during the class and be more relaxed for the rest of their lessons. The attention of the children would improve, therefor helping the teacher get through more of curriculums.  White (2009) discusses, “The atmosphere should feel peaceful, supportive, calm, warm, spacious, level, and uncluttered” (White 2009, p. 282). With a setting like this, it could improve children’s moods and with a more positive attitude and clear mind, the students will be more willing to learn. If a child in being forced to do yoga for medical interest, they are less likely to enjoy it.

BENEFITS OF TEACHING CHILDREN YOGA

Cooper (2010) studied the affects of yoga with children with special needs. This is a more complex approach at the healing power of yoga, however the results can be carried into examining yoga for children without special needs as well. He writes,  “It can also promote a stronger immune system and even digestive health by improving muscle tone” (Cooper 2010, p.25). The over all health of children is of great concern to both parents and society in general. If the child is physically healthy, their mental health will improve. The researchers Peck, Kehle, Bray and Theodore admit that in future research they could study more thoroughly on the affects of yoga and children and state, “future studies should examine the effects of yoga on other indices of social competence such as promoting children's social skills, stress management, and general well-being.” (Peck, Kehle,, Bray, & Theodore,  2005, p.422). The benefits of yoga reach far beyond physical health. A child could learn habits that could add guidance to their lives along with discipline and relaxation. Researchers studying Eastern and Western practices of meditation and yoga mention, “Such freedom of perception and thought allows for the meditator to control inner conflict and discover the element of choice within a perceived problem” (Vohra-Gupta, Russell, Lo, 2007, p.58). Early on, this could be a vital tool in directing a child’s life on a steady and healthy path.

CONCLUSION

There is much research to still be done regarding how a child can thrive from adding yoga to their daily lives. I believe that yoga could be taught as a way to raise children with independence and focus. It is lifestyles that can help young children develop physically and mentally. Yoga can teach children discipline, help develop a sense of self-authority, and also improve their physical health. With healthy habits taught to children at a young age, they could carry them with them throughout their lives. If we can see the powerful effect yoga can have on a fully developed adults mental state, we can imagine what it can do for a child still developing. The issues can be sorted out and addressed early on and may prevent issues later in life if yoga is implemented into a daily routine just as encouraging children to eat their vegetables is key. Getting children on the right path is vital.