Principles of Teaching 2 Flashcards
Families of Poses
Meditation Poses Surya Namaskaar/Vinayasa Standing Poses Active Hip Openers Hand Balancings Inversions Backbends Seated Poses Reclined Poses
Meditation Poses
Beginning and the end of the practice
Facilitate inward-focus and self-awareness
Although Balasana belongs to this group, it’s mostly not used for meditation but as a resting pose during the sequence
Benefits: Grounding Centering Quieting Calming Teach spinal length and postural alignment Freedom of breathing
Risk factors: Pain specially in back, knees, ankles Stiffness Discomfort Anxiety Fidgety-ness
Surya Namskaar Benefits and Risks
Benefits
Heats up the body
Mobilizes the main joints
Gets students out of their heads in the beginning of the class
Risks
Shoulders: Chatturanga and Plank can be very taxing for the shoulder joints, when too little stability
Lower back: Overarching of the lumbar in Urdha Mukha Svanasasana or Bhajungasana
Standing poses
(From accessible to less accessible)
Neutral Symmetrical
Externally Rotated
Neutral Asymmetrical
Neutral Standing Twists
Active hip openers
a
Hand balancings
a
Inversions
a
Seated poses
a
Reclined poses
a
Surya Namaskaar Sequencing Tips
Generally practiced at the beginning of the class to warm up the body and lubricate the major joints Can easily be modified to suit the needs for the peak pose of the class Different types: B more challenging while more difficult poses are incorporated into it Surya Namaskaar A and B derive from Ashtanga tradition
Neutral Symmetrical Standing Poses
Tadasana
Utthanasana
Utthkatasana
Prasarita Padottanasana
Benefits: Grounding and Stabilizing Midline Educating Brings body back to neutral Reveals common misalignments of the students
Risks:
Relatively risk-free, however past injuries or balance could be an issue for some students
Common component parts:
Neutral, square hips
Midline hugged in
Teaching tips:
While these poses resemble tadasana, they will show you student’s common misalignments and possible compensations
Externally Rotated Standing Poses
Virabhadrasana 2 Vrksasana Parsvakonasana Ardha Chandrasana Trikonasana Utthita Hasta Padangustasana B
Foundation:
Heel-Arch-Alignment
Benefits:
Activation of external rotators of the hip
Strengthening of the legs in general
Some of the poses open up the hamstrings
Risks:
torquing of the back knee if the pelvis and the back foot are not aligned properly
Common component parts:
External rotation of one hip
Broad chest
Tips for sequencing/teaching
Build in early in sequence, while fairly accessible
Teach the foundation clearly
As the key benefit of these poses is the external rotation of the hip, teach to maximize that benefit
Neutral Asymmetrical Standing Poses
Includes lots of poses, for example:
Virabhadrasana 1+3
Pyramid pose
Low and High Lunge
Neutral asymmetrical poses
Benefits:
Grounding, Energizing, Challenging, Heating, Opening (like Hamstrings in Pyramid Pose or Hip Flexors in Lunges)
Risks:
A bit trickier to balance, specially in poses with heel to heel position
Straight legs: Risk of hyperextension, Hamstring pull
Torquing of knee in poses like warrior and pyramid
Lumbar hyperextension in poses like high or low lunge
Neutral asymmetrical poses
Sequencing tips
While some of these poses are readily accessible like lunges, lots of these poses are quite challenging and should, as general rule, come rather later in the sequence
Use lunges to prepare for backbending (peak) poses
It’s advisable to link neutral symmetrical poses to other neutral symmetrical and asymmetrical to asymmetrical to avoid confusion
Common component parts
Midline
Neutral hips (or working towards such)
Outer hips hugging in
Neutral Standing Twists
Benefits: Body heating Core engaging Energizing Spinal Rotation Improves Balance
Risks
Possible spinal or disc injury
Hips not neutral
Poses with straight legs: Knee hyperextension, hamstring overstretching
Neutral Standing Twists
Sequencing tips:
Rather challenging, so use other standing poses to educate the hamstring opening first
It’s useful to teach them right after their foundation pose aka revolved triangle after pyramid pose etc.
While twists mobilize the spine and open the chest, they are excellent preparation for backbending poses
Common component parts: Midline Neutral hips Outer hips hugging in Spinal rotation
Teaching tips:
Cue neutral, square hips to stay stable in the pelvis
Use the strength of the adductors (“hug your legs together”) and the abductors (“hug the outer hips in”) to create the stability before students do the actual twist
Cue lengthening of the sides of the waist
Encourage “pure twists” without flexing or over -extending the spine or flexing sideways to get the biggest benefit out of the pose for your students
Active Hip Openers
Benefits:
Opens the hips and the hamstrings
Prepare for deeper poses
Energizing, Strengthening
Risks: Knee issues Hyperextension of the legs Overstretching Loss of stability, balance Lumbar compression in certain poses
Active Hip Openers
Sequencing Tips:
Some (Malasana, Ardha Hanumanasana) are relative mild and can be done relatively early in the sequence
For most, the body must be warmed up sufficiently
Help to create the deep opening necessary for backbends and inversions
Common component parts:
Midline
Outer hips hugging in
Teaching Tips:
To protect from falling into gravity and overstretching, teach the hugging in of the midline
Treat the knee as a pure hinge joint, cue tracking the knee with the ankle for example to avoid knee injury
Hand Balancings
Poses include:
Bakasana Vasisthasana Eka hasta bhujasana Bhujapidasana Tittibhasana Eka pada koundinyasana etc
Hand balancings
Benefits
promote scapular stability
energizing, strengthening
fun, enlivening, boundary busting
Risks:
Wrist/Hand/Shoulder issues and injuries
Falling or fear of falling
Anxiety in general
Common component parts Midline (engagement of adductors) Wrists/Hands awareness Core engagement Often hip flexion
Sequencing tips
Most of the poses in this group should be practiced more towards the end of the sequence
Active hip openers are often a good preparation directly before hand balancings in a sequence
Hand balancings
Teaching tips
First educate the position and the action of the hands clearly. Use other poses like adho mukha svanasana to start educating the hands before moving into more complex hand balancings
Use root-rebound cues to activate the lifting out of the gravity feeling
Engagement of the whole midline including legs so they don’t become dead weight
The shoulder girdle becomes the weight-bearer in most of the hand balancings and is therefore extremely important to adress to
To stabilize the shoulders, teach the universal paired action of the shoulder with front ribs drawn in, collarbones wide, shoulder blades stable
Always include a non-weight-bearing option or use navasana as preparatory pose before coming to hand balancings so some students can go back to it if they for some reason cannot do the hand balancing option
Inversions
Roughly divided in two different categories:
Heating and Cooling inversions
Heating inversions include poses like:
Handstand (adho mukha vrksasana) or
Forearmstand (pincha mayurasana)
Cooling inversions include poses like:
Shoulderstand (salamba sarvangasana)
Plow (halasana)
etc.
Benefits:
Heating inversions strengthen the whole upper body and teach proprioception
Change the gravitational impact on circulation of blood and lymph and can thus support with issues like Edema of the legs and so on
Cooling inversions can be very pacifying and restoreative
“turn the world upside down”
Risks:
Falling
Fear, anxiety
Arterielly hypertonie may be a contraindication
Students with low bloop pressure should be aware that sitting or standing up after the pose might cause light-headedness
Common component parts Midline Core Hands/Wrists Shoulder stability Shoulders in flexion and external rotation
Sequencing tips
For average practicioner, heating inversions (or stages to it) are usually the peak pose, cooling inversion are often taught right at the end of the class (maybe right before savasana)
Inversions
Teaching tips:
Teach at the wall
Do a demonstration first to show the key points
Teach key stabilizing actions, specially the shoulder girdle, before the students are weight-bearing
During the pose, restrain the cues to very simple ones:
For example “straighten your arms instead of “externally rotate your upper arms”
Offer clear stages, so everybody has something to work on
Show students how to get out of the pose safely using stabilizing cues
For weight bearing poses for the head and the neck, take care for the students to properly align their necks
Teach using the props
