Transcript:

Welcome back.

This lesson is about getting an accurate and valuable first impression of your students.

When a student walks into your class it's useful to have a systematic way of reading them at a glance to better understand what kinds of challenges they might be facing, what strengths they’re bringing to class and what kind of yoga, is going to be the most beneficial for them.

To do that we’re going to observe students according to their mobility and their activity.

So

When considering mobility, I think of students as existing on a spectrum between two extremes of ‘stability’ and ‘flexibility’. ‘Stable’ type constitutions have a denser, stiffer and potentially stronger structure. These people have connective tissue like the shocks of a car. Strong and built to be springy. And on the other side, the ‘Flexible’ type constitutions are light, mobile and agile. These people have connective tissue like slinkies. Very bendy, but they don’t generate much power.

Now, one of the pitfalls of determining a student's constitution is a tendency to lump all the big, heavy people into the ‘stable’ side and all of the small, thin people on the ‘flexible’ side. A person’s build isn’t necessarily a great indicator of mobility. Instead, try to pay attention to a person’s range of motion. If you’re not quite confident that you can recognize a normal range of motion by sight, the next lesson will present a short range of motion test you can use to identify extreme cases of stability and flexibility.

Right, so in addition to observing mobility we also want to make observations with regard to the students’ activity. When I say activity I’m talking not just about how much exercise they get, but about how they express themselves and interact with their environment. Similarly, we’re going to think of activity as existing on a spectrum between the extremes of ‘dynamic’ and ‘passive’.

Those with a ‘Dynamic’ activity level tend to be more energetically expressive, more active and more animated. Taken to the extreme, dynamic types can tend towards restlessness, anxiety and aggression.

On the other hand, ‘Passive’ types tend to be more energetically reserved, calmer and more languid. At the extreme end of the spectrum, passive types can also be apathetic, lethargic, and depressed.

Like observing mobility, it would be a good idea to start observing people with an eye for how they are expressing themselves energetically. To help you get started on this project I’m including a short list of questions to reflect on and qualities to look for while observing people.

So with these two metrics, mobility and activity, we can construct a graph and profile our students into one of four categories. From there we can guess as to what their strengths are, what overall challenges they can work on and what kind of yoga will be the most beneficial.

Transcript:

So we have an x y graph that charts mobility and activity. That means we’re organizing our students into one of four quadrants. And, purely for the sake of convention, I’m going to label these quadrants Fire Types, Air Types, Earth Types and Water Types. And if you’re wondering if this is supposed to be some kind of Ayurveda thing or Traditional Chinese Medicine thing, not intentionally, no. It’s just convenient and I’m an Avatar fan.

If you’re also a student of Ayurveda or Traditional Chinese Medicine or anything else and there seems to be some parallels, it wasn’t my intention. We’re going to contain our discussion of activity and mobility for these types.

So what are these constitutional types?

Fire Types are highly energetic and have a stable build. They probably have the strength and endurance for a demanding practice and enjoy physical challenges. Fire Types can improve upon their flexibility and would benefit from practicing calming, grounding practices.

Air Types are also highly dynamic and energetic, but unlike Fire Types, these types are lithe and limber. Air types can benefit from isometric strength training and stabilization drills.

Earth Types, on the other side of the graph, tend towards passivity, and stiffness. These types have a good deal of endurance and capacity to just chill and are best served by a practice that adds a little dynamism and flexibility to their life.

Water Types. Like Earth Types, water types also tend towards passive restfulness. They are also flexible and loose jointed. Water types can increase their intrinsic stability with dynamic energizing exercises.

What you might have noticed here is that the appropriate class, the way of practicing that will bring balance to the student, is to be found on the opposite side of the graph. We’ll talk more about different types of classes in a later module. But an important idea to begin weaving into your approach to teaching yoga is finding balance through opposing forces. Fire type people find balance through water type classes and so forth

There is one more thing that I want to mention about making general, eyeball assessments of students. This time this idea is borrowed from Ayurveda. That is the difference between somebody’s inherent, long-term constitution or PRAKRITI. And somebody’s current condition or VIKRITI. When we’re sizing up a potential student we should remember that there are a million things we don’t know about them. Perhaps for example we encounter a FIRE type person recovering from an injury or illness. On that day they might display more of the characteristics we associate with Earth or Water types.

But, don’t worry about second guessing your conclusions. Continue to make observations to the best of your ability and as new information about your students come to light you will be able to update your assessment.

Ok in our next lesson we’re going to move on to observing posture and becoming more attuned to what specific challenges a student can work on.

Transcript

We’re on our way to making some specific observations regarding posture. But before we can dive into that we need to cover some vocabulary words. Just so we’re all on the same page. I know vocabulary can be a bit dry, but I really think it will behoove you to adopt these words into your working vocabulary. This short list is simple enough to be intuitively understood by students and robust enough to accurately describe the postural shape of your students.

I also know that getting this from a video is not everyone’s favorite learning format so I’m also going to include this list as a readable document in the resources.

These words are directional references and are taken in reference as if we are looking at a student standing in Tadasana

ANTERIOR and POSTERIOR this is the front side and back side of the body.

SUPERIOR and INFERIOR these are relative terms to describe above and below. ‘The hips are superior to the knees.’ The ribs are inferior to the neck.

MEDIAL and LATERAL. You may have heard the terms internal and external to mean the same thing. MEDIAL means towards the mid-line of the body. And Lateral, away from the midline.

And now the words to describe movement. These descriptive terms describe relative movement in the body. That is movement of one structure in relation to another.

TILT. A tilt is a simple deviation from the vertical or the horizontal. That is, when one side of the structure is higher or lower than the other. For convention, we say that the tilt is in the direction of the top of the structure.

BEND. A bend is just a series of tilts that result in a curve. We’re going to use ‘bend’ exclusively when referring to the spine. It bends as a result of tilts in the vertebrae.

ROTATE. Rotation occurs around the vertical axis of the body and we name the rotation based on what the direction the front of the structure is pointing.

SHIFT. A shift is a displacement of the center of gravity of a structure. We can talk about shifts of one part of the body relative to another as well as the shift of the whole body relative to gravity.

Great. So now that we have a working vocabulary let’s take a look at some specific observations.

Transcript:

Alright. In this lesson we’re going to start reading the posture of student’s bodies. But before we jump into the nitty-gritty details there are a couple important things that I want to mention.

When we start the process of observing in greater detail, it’s easy to fall into what I call the ‘problem-solver’ mindset. As teachers, we want to be effective, we want to help students overcome their challenges. But focusing on what our students can improve can blind us to the strengths they are bringing to the class. Believe it or not, most students are not walking bags of problems. Most people have a lot of things going for them and only a few areas that challenge them. So before beginning a process of observing posture, I think it’s important to identify the strengths that our student has.

Transcript:

Ok yoga teachers, in this exercise we’re going to be using utkatasana as a template for identifying imbalances in the posture. We’re going to make our assessment by looking at individual structures of the body, but I want to say explicitly that this observation is not going to tell us about the conditions of individual muscles. (for that we would need much more detailed and wider range of tests)

Instead, what this assessment will tell us is how groups of muscles are working together and highlight compensatory patterns in the posture. In other words, when something is out of balance, there is a domino effect throughout the whole body. This assessment is going to pull that train of dominoes to the forefront so that we can really see what we’re working with.

For this assessment we’re going to observe our students practicing utkatasana. I know there are a lot of ways to practice utkatasana depending on which lineage you’re familiar with, so quickly I’m going to break down the blueprint for the utkatasana we’re going to use here.

The Feet. Set the feet hip distance apart and align the heels behind the second toe so the inner arches of the feet are parallel. (Here, hip distance means directly underneath the Anterior Superior Iliac Spine)

The Knees. Align the knees under the hips and point the knees straight forward (also in the direction of the second toe.

The Pelvis. Maintain a normal lumbar curve in the spine so the Anterior Superior Iliac Spine (the ASIS) and the Posterior Superior Iliac Spine (the PSIS) are within an inch of level. Also, there is no left to right imbalance.

The Torso. The line of the torso remains nearly perpendicular to the line of the pelvis (that’s between the ASIS and PSIS). Also, the line of the torso remains parallel to the line of the shins.

In the Shoulder Girdle the shoulder blades sit down and back. That is to say, they rotate upward with the head of the arm bone lifting higher than the superior angle of the scapula.

Finally the Arms. The arms should flex to 180 degrees so the arm bones align alongside the ears and should abduct to between 150 and 170 degrees.

Transcript:

Ok, so this is the utkatasana we’re working with. Now lets cover the specific observations we’re going to look for. Keep track of your observations either on your own or by using the utkatasana assessment sheet provided in the resources.

Let’s look at the observations we can make from the front.

Feet Rotate Laterally. Observe the alignment of the heels and the toes as your student enters utkatasana. In lateral rotation the heels will be closer together than the second and third toe.

Knees Shift Laterally or Medially relative to the hips. To eyeball this, drop an imaginary line from the ASIS down to the floor and note whether the knees shift medially or laterally of this line.

Arms Tilting Laterally. That is, the arms adduct, not quite reaching all the way overhead. Observe the angle between the torso and the arms. Somewhere around 180 to 170 degrees is normal. Make a note if the angle is less than that.

Observations from the Back

Feet Tilting Medially relative to the shins. That is to say ‘flat feet’. Sometimes this can be hard to spot from the front, but if you look at the back posture from the back the achilles tendon will clearly indicate medial tilt by bowing medially.

Asymmetrical Weight Shift. Finally, look for imbalances between the left and right sides of the posture. Draw an imaginary line from the middle point between the feet upward through the whole body. If more weight looks like it falls on one side or the other make a note.

Shoulders tilt inferiorly and anteriorly. In other words, the shoulders elevate and cramp up around the neck. If you’re looking for landmarks, the superior angle of the scapula rotates above superiorly of the shoulder socket.

Observations from the side

Anterior Pelvic Tilt or Posterior Pelvic Tilt. In other words hyper-lordosis or hypo-lordosis. This is best viewed from the side. Observe the angle of the pelvis by eyeballing the line between the ASIS and the PSIS. In a balanced pose the ASIS will be within one or two inches below the PSIS. Any more than that puts the pelvis into anterior tilt. When the ASIS begins to lift above the PSIS the pelvis tilts posteriorly. Check the curvature of the spine. During anterior pelvic tilt the lumbar spine will increase its curve. If the low back looks like it is flattening out the pelvis is tilting posteriorly.

Ok. Anterior Tilt in the torso relative to the hips. That is to say, the torso leans too far forward. Draw an imaginary line from the mid armpit down the torso to the hips. Then another imaginary line from along the shins. In a balanced pose the lines will be parallel, notice whether the torso line and the shin line look like they would intersect at the top.

And conversely, Posterior Tilt in the torso relative to the hips, in other words, the torso doesn’t lean forward far enough. Draw the same imaginary lines through the torso and the shins and check if those lines look like they would intersect at the bottom.

Arms tilt anteriorly relative to the scapula. That is, the arms don’t quite flex all the way up alongside the ears when locked straight.

AND THEN...

So, after making your way through these observation checkpoints and noting them down in your assessment, we’re actually going to have the students do this exercise again, this time with a slight modification.

In our first modification, using a rolled up yoga mat, folded blanket or some other kind of prop, ask your students to step their heels on the prop while keeping the front of their feet on the ground. With their heels elevated two to three inches, instruct your student to perform utkatasana again and look for changes in the feet rotating laterally, knees shifting medially or laterally and the pelvis tilting anteriorly or posteriorly.

In the second modification, ask your student to practice utkatasana again with the feet flat on the floor. No prop. But tell them to lower their arms down by their sides. Here, note any changes in pelvic tilt, and extension or flexion of the spine.

Making note of these deviations in the key parts of the body will go a long way towards helping us plan our class. And doing the assessment twice, once with and once without the modification will help us zero in on the root causes of our students' imbalance. But for now, don’t worry about trying to interpret the signs, just make clear observations to the best of your ability and record them in your notebook or using the observation template from the resources.

fin……………...

One final tip. Don’t give your student too many instructions for this first utkatasna. The idea isn’t to have them do it with ideal alignment, we want to get a clean picture of what their natural imbalances are. So for that, keep the instructions minimal. During an initial observation I usually tell them to lock out their arms and reach their hands overhead. Then, standing with their feet hip distance apart, bend their knees as if they are sitting down into a chair.

Transcript:

Welcome to Module Two yoga teachers. This Module is all about how to research as a teacher.

During this module I’m going to assume that we’ve had basic training in practicing asana, this course won’t be covering instructions in how to teach individual poses. What I want to present is a framework that will organize our knowledge and experiences and give some direction for our focus while we are practicing. This work is super important and will prepare us to plan an effective, goal oriented lesson.

If you don't feel comfortable guiding yourself through asana practice or you’re looking to boost your game in anatomy and kinesiology, I’m going to leave some recommendations in the sidebar for you to check out.

Alright, so in this module we will be building out an ‘Asana Analysis’. Basically our asana analysis will tell us about all we need to know about a pose before we start planning our class. We’ll feel out the details of our Analysis in four parts.

In the first part we will categorize asanas into their essential families.

In the second we will take a look at the myofascial structure and how it relates to asana practice

In the third part we have a simple strategy for focusing on the alignment details of an asana

And in the last part I’ll offer some suggestions for how to capture and share your experience in the asana.

Transcript:

Ok yoga teachers, at this point in our process we have filled out our observation template and completed an assessment of utkatasana. And now we’re going to take our observation notes and translate them into descriptions of muscles that will help us plan a class for our students.

We’re going to do this with a muscle and joint table. For every imbalance we noted in our assessment we’re going to identify which muscles are LONG and which ones are SHORT.. It’s helpful to think of each joint or group of joints as having a ‘bow’ and a ‘bowstring’. On the SHORT side of the joint, the ‘bowstring’ pulls tight, closing the joint, on the LONG side of the joint the ‘bow’ lengthens and stretches.

We can see the ‘bowstring’, the short side of the joint. The lateral side of the shin and ankle. And the ‘bow’, the medial side of the foot where the arch is flattening. We want to identify the muscles that are tightening those that are stretching long.

Let's take the example of feet tilting medially:

We can see that the outside (the lateral side) of the joint is shortening and the bottom of the foot is being pulled down towards the floor. The curving achilles tendon is our clue here. So we can assume that the muscles are responsible for eversion (or medially tilting the ankle) and plantar flexion (or lifting the heel above the toes). So these muscles are short. The fibularis, the gastrocnemius and the soleus.

Conversely, those muscles responsible for laterally tilting the ankle and dorsiflexion ( or pulling the toes above the heel) are stretched long. The tibialis anterior and tibialis posterior.

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So, translating our observations into long and short tables seems like a pretty straight forward process. And it is, especially if we are looking at a single isolated joint, like medially tilting ankles.

The problem of course is that rarely, if ever, are we going to meet somebody with a single, isolated imbalance. Much more likely is that our student displays a number of imbalances. The body is a holistic structure and when one thing goes out of balance it has consequences for the rest of the structure.

The bad news is that figuring out the short and long tables for a whole body of imbalance structures starts to look overwhelming. The good news is that bodies tend to fall into similar patterns and with some practice we can begin to recognize these patterns.

In this next section we’re going to cover the most common imbalance patterns you’re likely to come across and the short and long tables associated with those patterns.

FOUNDATIONAL IMBALANCE

When there is an imbalance in the feet, that imbalance expresses itself throughout the whole leg. This imbalance pattern demonstrates inadequate dorsiflexion and a chain of imbalances in the legs and hips that result from it. Foundational imbalance can express itself as:

Feet flatten

Feet turn-out

Knees bow-in

Excessive lordosis

Excessive forward lean

Asymmetrical Weight Shift

We use the modified utkatasana with the heels elevated to weed out imbalances in the foundation from imbalances in other parts of the body.

If we note any of these imbalances during our initial utkatasana assessment and they are corrected during the modified assessment with the heels lifted, then we can assume that the root of the imbalance is inadequate dorsiflexion.

If the imbalances continue to persist and are not improved in the modification, then we must look higher up the body for the root cause of the imbalance.

If the imbalances are improved but still present during the modification, then we can assume that the root of the student's imbalance is in both the foundation and higher up.

Let’s take a look at the short muscles for this imbalance

Transcript:

PELVIC IMBALANCE

The pelvic imbalance pattern is characterized by anterior pelvic tilt and excessive extension in the lumbar spine. Sometimes this imbalance pattern is called ‘lower cross syndrome’ or ‘hyper-lordosis’. In addition to anterior tilt in the pelvis, this imbalance pattern can express itself with many of the same observable deviations other imbalance patterns. They can include.

Knees shifting medially or laterally. Yes, either one might be present. Again, the real key sign we’re looking for is anterior tilt in the pelvis.

An anteriorly tilting torso.

Asymmetrical Weight Shift.

Arms tilt anteriorly.

The arms might seem like an odd sign to correlate with a pelvic imbalance. But the arms connect to the low back via the latissimus and shorting of the extensors of the back may display in the arms tilting forward.

Comparing the results of our initial utkatasana assessment with our modified utkatasana assessment will help us determine the root causes of our students imbalance pattern.

If we note any of these imbalances during our initial assessment and those imbalances are corrected during the modified utkatasana with the heels lifted then we can assume that the imbalance is with the foundation, not the pelvis.

If those imbalances are not corrected during the modification with heels lifted, then we can assume the imbalance pattern stems from the pelvis.

And, if some of the imbalances are corrected or improved, but still present during the modification, then the student’s imbalance pattern includes both pelvic AND foundation imbalance.

Anterior pelvic tilt can be the result of excessive tension in either the hip flexors or the latissimus dorsi muscle along the back. By comparing our initial utkatasana assessment with the arms up to our modified assessment with the arms down, we can determine if the imbalance stems from the pelvis or the upper body.

If the student demonstrates anterior pelvic tilt in the initial assessment with the arms up and not in the modified assessment with the arms down, this indicates an imbalance in the upper body.

If lowering the hands down by the side does nothing to improve the anterior tilt of the pelvis, this indicates that the imbalance originates with the pelvis.

If lowering the hands down by the side improves the anterior tilt of the pelvis, but the imbalance is still present, then the student’s posture includes both upper body and pelvic imbalance patterns.

Let's look at the long and short muscles for pelvic imbalance.

Transcript:

Sacro-lumbar Imbalance

This imbalance pattern is characterized by dysfunction at the sacroiliac joint. Resulting perhaps from an old injury or otherwise having difficulty bending forward. You will observe posterior pelvic tilt, posteriorly tilting torso and knees shifting laterally. This imbalance pattern is often more pronounced on one side than another so it is likely to include left to right asymmetry as well.

Like our other imbalance patterns, by comparing our initial utkatasana assessment with our modified utkatasana assessment we can determine whether any of these signs are the result of imbalances in the feet or upper body.

A posteriorly tilting torso relative to the hips, that is to say, not leaning forward far enough during utkatasana is a somewhat uncommon imbalance and one more likely to be present in hyper-flexible students with lots of dorsiflexion in the ankles.

If we notice this imbalance in our initial assessment we can assume there is some imbalance in the Lumbar-Sacral region. But, observing this imbalance in the modified assessment with the heels lifted is NOT indicative of an imbalance.

In the case of Knees shifting laterally and asymmetrical weight distribution,

If we note that knees shift laterally or the weight shifts asymmetrically during our initial assessment, but are corrected during our modified assessment with the heels lifted, that will inform us that imbalance centers around the foundation of the feet.

If we note that the knees shift laterally or there is asymmetrical weight distribution during our initial assessment and those imbalances continue to persist in the modified assessment, them we need to look to the Lumbar-Sacral region.

And finally, it’s possible that both the imbalance contains elements of both lumbar-sacral imbalance and foundation imbalance. If the knees shift laterally and there is asymmetrical weight distribution during the initial assessment and those imbalances improve but are still present in the modified assessment, then this would be the case.

Let’s look at the posterior tilt of the pelvis.

We know that Anterior Pelvic tilt (the opposite) can be the result of excessive tension of the latissimus dorsi muscles on the back.

So, by that logic, if the posterior pelvic tilt we observe in our initial assessment is WORSENED when we shorten those muscles by bringing our arms down we can assume that the imbalance is in the upper body.

If by contrast we observe no change in the posterior pelvic tilt of our modified utkatasana assessment, we will know that the imbalance is with the Lumbar-Sacral region.

So let’s look at the short and long muscles for this imbalance pattern.

Transcript:

Upper Body Imbalances are generally characterized by short muscles superior and anterior of the shoulder blades and long muscles inferior and posterior to them. Key things to look for in an upper body imbalance are shoulders shifting superiorly, arms tilting forward relative to the torso and arms tilting laterally, that is arms adducting.

An upper body imbalance can also include anterior pelvic tilt and asymmetrical distribution of weight.

Anterior Pelvic tilt can be indicative of both an upper body imbalance and a pelvic imbalance. We can compare our initial utkatasana assessment to a modified utkatasana with the arms down alongside the body to determine which.

If we notice anterior pelvic tilt in the initial assessment with the arms up, but not in the modification with the arms down, that will indicate to us that the latissimus dorsi muscle is tight and our student is exhibiting an upper body imbalance.

If bringing the arms down does nothing to improve the anterior tilt of the pelvis, then the imbalance is rooted in the pelvis.

And if bringing the arms down improves the anterior tilt of the pelvis, but it is still present then our student has both upper body and pelvic imbalance.

Construct a muscle and joint table of long and short muscles and check your work with the Upper Body Imbalance Pattern Muscle and Joint Table in the resources.

Transcript:

Doing research as a teacher means practicing with an attentiveness to detail in order to capture our experiences in a way that makes them easy to share and understand. Keeping an Asana Journal is a good first step in organizing our knowledge about what we are teaching.

Our basic Asana Analysis will do four things for us.

First, it will sort similar poses together. Instead of trying to keep track of a bunch of different postures, we can break them down into a few easily manageable categories.

Second, our analysis will let us know which groups of muscles are working together. I’ll explain more about four functional groups of muscles and which types of poses activate them. This will highlight similarities between poses and further allow us to observe our student’s posture as a holistic whole.

Third, our analysis will outline the concrete details of alignment for the arms and shoulder, the spine and pelvis, and the hips and legs. This will be important when we begin thinking about what cues to give our students.

Fourth, our analysis will cover the energetic details of alignment. These are the qualities that describe how it feels and how we relate to the effort we are making.

Starting an anasa journal with these four items will put us well on our way to planning powerful individually tailored classes. So, let’s take a look at each of these one by one.

Transcript:

The first thing we want to do in our asana analysis is identify which family an asana belongs to. I recommend defining asana families in terms of their orientation to gravity. That is Standing, Sitting, Supine, Prone, Inverted or Quadrupedal.

This first part of our asana analysis is pretty straight forward but lets just cover these basic terms so we’re on the same page.

Standing. Standing means that the majority of your weight is on your feet or your knees. So lunges with one knee on the ground are in my mind still a standing pose.

Sitting. Sitting means that the majority of your weight is on your sitting bones. I’m including kneeling poses where the feet are under the hips as sitting poses as well even though technically there is weight in the feet. It’s kind of one of those ‘use your best judgement’ definitions.

Supine. Supine means on the back facing up. If there is weight on any part of the back, the back of the legs, the sacrum, the shoulders, the ribs, the pose is supine.

Prone. Prone means facing down, it's the opposite of supine. If there is weight on the front of the torso or, the hips the pose is prone.

Inverted. Inverted means that the feet are above the hips and the hips are above the shoulders. Sometimes this definition can be tricky since it is possible for poses to be partially inverted such as downward facing dog. But for our purposes and for this course, we mean ‘total inversions’

Quadrupedal. Quadrupedal means four footed. In these poses the hands and arms are doing the job of legs. These poses can be face down as in the case of table pose or face up as in the case of upward facing bow. I’m also including arm balancing in this family as well even though technically those are ‘two footed’.

Ok in the next section of our asana analysis we are going to define the major joint actions of the pose.

Transcript:

Welcome back yoga teachers. We are continuing our exploration of the asana analysis. In this part we will look at a simple system for organizing the coarse, general alignments for any given pose. This part of our asana analysis will provide for us the building blocks of cueing students safely in and out of poses and train our attention to the parts of the body we need to be observing while teaching.

First let’s have a quick review of vocabulary for talking about the actions of joints in the body. Remember, all these definitions are taken as deviations from anatomical neutral or tadasana.

Flexion means to decrease the angle between two bones. For some joints like the elbow this seems pretty obvious. For others it’s not as clear. For example, raising your arm alongside your ear is flexion of the shoulder socket. You probably hear ‘extend your arms overhead’ as a common cue quite often. And I’m not saying it's a bad cue if the students know what you mean, but technically it’s flexion. In the case of the spine, flexion means forward bending and during side bending we specify by saying ‘lateral flexion’.

Extension. Extension means to increase the angle of a joint. If a joint can flex then it’s opposite action is extension. In the spine, extension is backbending.

Rotation. Rotation is a term that requires us to give a little bit more information. We can rotate left or right in the case of the spine. We can rotate medially or laterally in the case of the shoulder socket and hip socket. And we can rotate inferiorly or superiorly in the case of the shoulder blades in relation to the rib cage.

Adduction. Adduction means to bring the limbs closer to the midline of the body. Using the inner thighs to pull the legs together for example is adduction of the hips.

Abduction. Abduction is the opposite of adduction and means to take the limbs away from the midline of the body.

So together, these five terms will take us pretty far when it comes to describing the actions of an asana. Now, let's take a look at how we’re going to put them to work.

I find it easiest to think of the body as in three sections, The Spine and Pelvis, The Arms and Shoulders, and the Legs and Hips (that is the hip socket). For each of these sections we’ll define the major joint actions with our movement vocabulary.

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So, in trikonasana, what are the key joint actions in the feet, legs and hips.

The ankle is in plantar flexion, the knee is extending to neutral and the hip is abducting and rotating laterally.

So that’s the lower body, what is happening in the pelvis and spine?

The pelvis and the spine are basically maintaining neutral alignment aside from the neck, which rotates to the left or the right, so I won’t have very much to put in this section. I should point out however that just because there is not MOVEMENT doesn’t mean there isn’t ACTION. The joints and structures of the pelvis and spine are not MOVING much, this is true. But the muscles of the body are doing a great deal of ACTION to keep them in alignment. We’ll talk more about the muscles in the next section.

Allright, and what are the joint movements in the arms and shoulders.

Here the shoulder sockets are fully abducting and rotating laterally. And, the shoulder blade is rotating superiorly. That is the shoulders are pulling back and down.

So once we’ve identified what the joints of the body are doing for our particular asana we can begin to identify what muscles and or connective tissues are acting upon those joints to give them that particular shape.

As a general rule anything that crosses a joint will have an effect on its movement. For our basic asana analysis however it’s not going to be essential that we identify every single one of the muscles that cross any given particular joint.

We are going to focus our attention on the prime mover of the action or the Agonist. And that muscle’s antagonist, the one that provides resistance and moves the joint in the opposite direction. It’s important to note here that ‘stretch’ here doesn’t necessarily mean ‘relax’. It means ‘eccentric contraction’. That is, to remain engaged while lengthening.

Let’s look again at Trikonasana again. We identified the key movements of the lower body, now we want to know which muscles are contracting to drive those movements and which muscles are lengthening to allow the movement.

The agonists of the lower body, driving the actions of Plantar Flexion, Knee Extension and Lateral Rotation are Gastrocnemius, Soleus, Quadriceps, Sartorius, ‘Deep Six’ rotators, Psoas. Glute Max

And their Antagonists, Tibialis Anterior, Fibularis, Hamstrings, Adductors, Tensor Fascia Latte and Gluteus Medius

Now, having a firm grip on functional anatomy is important and knowing the names of the muscles, where they attach and what actions they perform is a worthy goal. But even if you’re still learning all of that, this is still a useful exercise. You don’t need to know the names of the muscles to know what part of the body needs to be shortened and what part needs to be lengthened.

Alternatively, you can fill in the table this way.

The Agonists are Back of the Calf, Front of the Thigh and Outside and Back of the Hip. The antagonists are Front and Outside of the shin, Back of the Thigh and Inner Thigh.

I of course recommend learning the names of the muscles. But if you’re not sure of the name, don’t let that stop you from trying to see the mechanical relationships between the various parts of the body. So long as you can describe those relationships in a way that makes sense for you, you’ll be set to start planning lessons in our next module.

Let’s finish up with Trikonasana and identify the agonists and antagonists for the Spine and Pelvis, and the Arms and Shoulders.

So, note here that in the case of Pelvis & Spine, even though there isn’t much movement in the joints, the muscles of the back and torso (the transversus abdominus, obliques, erectors and sternocleidomastoid) are still engaging to stabilize those joints. And also, since this is a unilateral pose, one side will be the agonist while the other is the antagonist.

And finally, the arms and shoulders. Generally, the agonists in trikonasana are located along the back of the body. The deltoids, rhomboids, lower traps triceps and rotator cuff muscles. The antagonists are Pectoralis major & minor, Serratus Anterior, Biceps, Upper Trapezius and Rotator Cuff (only the subscapularis)

So, there we have Trikonasana. Now, I know what you’re thinking. Gee, that seems like a lot of work. Are you saying that I have to do this for every single pose? Well, it depends. To start I’d recommend doing it for the handful of poses that you most often practice yourself. As you go through, you’ll begin to see the patterns and similarities between poses and the process will become much faster. Abduction of the hip is abduction of the hip. Lateral rotation is lateral rotation. No matter which pose you’re thinking about you will see the same muscles and patterns of engagement again and again.

As part of your research process, I recommend not only that you look at anatomy resources, but that you practice these poses and feel for yourself which muscles are strengthening in and which are stretching.

Filling out this part of our asana analysis should feel similar to the work we did filling out the muscle and joint tables for our assessment of utkatasana. When it comes to planning our class, we are going to begin combining our knowledge of asana with observations of our students.

In the final section of our asana analysis we are going to put some thought into the subtle and energetic ways we experience a pose. See you there.

Alright yoga teachers, this is the last part of our asana analysis. In this last lesson we’re going to try to unpack some tools for capturing how a pose feels. It’s one thing to have the concrete details of alignments squared away. But once in a pose, your students will appreciate some direction for how to bring the posture to life. How you do this is what is going to give your style of teaching its unique flavor, and it’s worth spending time with the poses you plan to teach trying to capture the feeling of the pose you want to share.

To get started in the last part of our research, these are the three questions that I ask myself when I am practicing to better convey my experience of the pose.

Number one. Foundation and Focal point.

Quite simply, the foundation of the pose is the part of the body that’s bearing weight. In standing poses it’s the feet, in sitting poses it’s the sitting bones, in the headstand it’s the top of the head and arms.

Focal point is a little bit more subtle. The focal point of the pose is the point in the body where downward, grounding energy meets upward, lifting energy. Think of the focal point as the point in the body from which energy radiates. If the sense of a pose’s focal point sounds unfamiliar to you I recommend trying to experience three focal points for yourself.

The hips in standing poses where the foundation is in the feet

The heart, in poses where there is weight in the arms and shoulders

And the roof of the mouth, in cases where the top of the head is bearing weight.

Being able to draw your students attention to the connection between the foundation and the focal point of the pose will go a long way to bringing life to their practice.

Next. What is the quality of the pose’s energy? There are five vayus of prana or qualities of energy in the body. If you are familiar with all five then this would be the place to record which vayus are most dominant in the pose. If vayus don’t sound familiar then ask yourself, ‘Is the pose expansive and energizing or grounding and calming?’ A good rule of thumb is that backbending poses are ‘pranic’ or energizing, forward folds are ‘apanic’ or calming and twists are ‘samanic’ or balancing. True, that’s only three, but that should be enough to get you started.

Having a sense of a poses energetic quality will help us appropriately sequence postures as well give our students a hint as to what they should be aware of while in the pose.

And finally, in this last part of the asana analysis I record any creative imagery or metaphors that occur to me or that have helped me while practicing the pose, such as ‘Sending roots down through your feet’ or ‘drawing energy up the front of your spine’. I’m sure you’ve heard a few of these yourself besides. Creative and useful imagery could be the subject of a lesson in its own right and there is for too much to say on it here. My advice is to be guided by what has been helpful to you and your own imagination. If you want to dive into this topic more deeply then look into the research on ideokinesiololgy.

Transcript:

Alright. The first part of our lesson plan will tell us general information about the lesson and give us more details about its theme. So let’s take a look.

Number one. The title. The title of the lesson is important for you because if and when you come back to this lesson plan you’re going to want to know what it is. It doesn’t need a creative clever title. Probably your students don’t really care or know what the title is. Just something that will tell you a little bit about the lesson, who it’s for, what it’s for or where or when you’re going to teach it should be enough.

Number two. Write down how long of a class you’re planning. If you are writing your first lesson plan I recommend planning a 60 or 75 minute class.

Number three write down any props you’re going to need. Now, we haven’t even planned the class yet, so this may be something that we come back to at the end.

Number four. Write down who this class is for. We’re interested in knowing what our student’s element type is or at least what their condition is when they are taking this class. Make any notes about the student’s past experience practicing yoga or other activities and note if they have any special conditions, limitations or pain. Include here any information you thought was relevant if you’ve had a chance to talk to them. If you haven’t, make general notes about the kind of student this class might be for. The difficulty of the class and the kind of person this potential student is. For example, a runner, a pregnant woman, a desk worker etcetera.

Alright and with that, we’ll move on to this next section. Determining our class type and goals.

Diksa. In the notes section write down what the students need to understand from this Act or Scene. You can write this in the form of a concept checking question or make a note about the actions you want to see the students doing.

Choosing a theme for our class, we want to establish what type of class this will be.

But, what is a class type? Remember the graph from the first module that charts our student’s mobility and activity level? We had four ‘elemental types’ of people. Well, we can use the same concept to define four elemental types of classes. Earth type, Fire type, Air type and Water type classes. Again, these names are somewhat arbitrary, just remember which quadrant of our graph they correspond with.

Fire type classes emphasize dynamic strength and endurance to keep moving. If you can imagine a class with a lot of lunges and push-ups, and not much resting or holding, that would be a fire type class.

Earth type classes emphasize isometric strength and the stability to hold poses for an extended period. Imagine holding a plank or balancing on one leg. These kinds of long, strength holds are what we’ll find in an Earth type class

Air type classes emphasize fluidity and flexibility. Air type classes explore the movement from one pose to the next and develop a full range of motion. If you can imagine flowing in and out of a forward fold, that might fit well into an air type class.

Water type classes focus on deep prolonged stretches and relaxation. If you are stretching to your full range of motion and holding there, or using foam rollers and tennis balls to release your muscles you are in a water type class.

So, both Water Type and Earth Type classes emphasize holding poses, and both Fire and Air type classes emphasize transitions. This can be a little confusing, but there is a simple way to sort them out. Ask, ‘does holding this pose or doing this transition require more strength or flexibility?’ There is no one answer. A pose or transition may fit into either category depending on the abilities and challenges of the student.

So, those are the types of classes we are working with and we want to match the student with the opposite type of class. A fire type class will be most appropriate for a water type student, somebody with a high degree of natural flexibility and low activity. An air type class will be most appropriate for an Earth type student, somebody with low mobility and low activity.

Take note here. We’re not choosing one type of class to the exclusion of all other types. That is to say for example, a fire type class EMPHASIZES dynamic strength, but can’t also include some long deep stretches or some isometric holds. If we were to graph a FIRE type class, it would look like THIS. Not This. Those inclusions from the other types of classes is what leaves the class feeling balanced and holistic.

And finally, remember to be aware of both the students ‘long term condition and their ‘short term circumstances’. Maybe a student is generally a fire type, but after a recent pregnancy is expressing herself as more of a water type. Just be aware of who your lesson is for and that the same type of lesson may not always suit that person.

Got it? Good. In the next lesson we will cover goal setting for the class.

Transcript:

Right. We’ve chosen what type of class we’re going to teach. In this next section, we will write down specific goals for our class. I think this is where a lot of people get off track. We’re not talking about the goals of yoga in the broad sense, we want specific, actionable goals that make this class different.

To that end, I am offering two methods for defining the goals of our class. The first method works well if you are teaching a private student and if follows directly from the observations we made in module one. In method one your goal section is going to have three things.

It is going to identify the imbalance pattern we will be addressing with our class.

It is going to define the movements we will emphasize.

And, it is going to include a peak pose or transition that expresses the movement we are emphasizing.

So let’s look at each of those three points.

Our goal identifies the imbalance pattern we will work with. Remember in our utkatasana assessment we identified four different imbalance patterns.

Foundational Imbalance

Pelvic Imbalance

Sacro-Lumbar Imbalance

Upper Body Imbalance

If our student demonstrates the classic signs of one of these imbalances then our decision here is pretty easy. But if our student demonstrates more than one of these imbalance patterns, then we must prioritize our approach. I recommend addressing imbalances in this order:

First, the imbalance that is most debilitating.

Then, any parts of the body that are asymmetrical

Next, the most dramatic imbalance

Finally, work from the ground up.

Conversely, what if we didn’t find any imbalances in our assessment? If you don’t find anything to work on in your utkatasana assessment that’s okay. In that case method two for setting your goals. (We’ll talk about that in the next section) As you work with your student through different poses you will begin to see which movements they are weak in and start to focus your efforts.

So, having identified the imbalance pattern we want to work with, the next part of our goal is to choose the kind of movements we are going to be doing with our body. For help with this we can go to the muscle and joint table we constructed for our student. The kind of movement we want to emphasize is the opposite of movement in their imbalance.

We will want to lengthen muscles that are short and integrate muscles that are lengthened.

Did we notice that our student has an anterior pelvic tilt? We want to emphasize posterior pelvic tilting. Did we notice that our student medially rotates at the hip? We want to emphasize lateral rotation. You get the idea.

To make this process easier, in the resources I am going to include posture suggestions for imbalances we covered in module two.

Take some time to brainstorm poses and or transitions that will serve your students needs and save this list to reference for future classes.

Alright, the last piece of our goal setting in method one is to choose a pose or transition that emphasizes the body part and movement we’ve chosen. If we’re teaching a Fire Type class, we’ll choose a transition that requires an intense amount of strength. If an Air class, a transition that asks for a good degree of flexibility. If we’re teaching an Earth class, we’ll choose a pose that needs strength to hold and a Water class, a pose that asks us to relax into a deep stretch.

For example, if we are teaching a Water class for a student with a Pelvic imbalance pattern, we might choose to focus on the tilt of the hips. Supposing it is posterior tilting that our student needs to practice, we might choose Supta Virasana as a peak pose. Whether or not we actually get to the peak pose is somewhat beside the point. The peak pose acts as a kind of place holder so we can sequence our class intelligently. It’s a direction, not a destination and the benefit is in the journey. But, try to choose your peak pose based on what you think your students might one day reasonably manage.

Ok. So method one for setting a class goal is basically trying to meet the needs of individuals by exploring ‘the opposite’. We observe their individual tendencies and plan to address them with opposing forces.

Transcript:

Alright yoga teachers. By now we’ve filled out the ‘theme’ section of our lesson plan. We know what ‘elemental type’ of class we are going to teach, and either we’re planning to teach a general all-around class, or we know what movements and muscles we will emphasize and have peak pose to structure our class around.

Our next step is to plot the path we are going to take through that general sequence or towards that pose.

If you look at the template from the resources, you’ll see that the ‘sequence’ section of the template is divided into three columns. In the first column we want to note how much time we expect to spend on a pose or group of poses. The second column we will record what postures we’re going to teach. And in the third column we will write down any special notes for those postures. This might be a cue we want to give or a certain action we want to emphasize.

This template is for our own benefit and we want to make it as easy to read and understand as we can. Writing down all of the poses we want to teach in one big list is like trying to read a page of text with no paragraphs or punctuation. To make it easier on ourselves, we’re going to divide the class into discrete sections.

Now, a good class has dramatic structure. Just like a good story has an exposition, a build-up, a climax and a denouement. A good class gradually increases in depth, complexity and intensity before resolving in savasana. So for that reason, I find it easiest diving my class into ‘Acts’ and ‘Scenes’.

‘Acts’ represents the general stages of learning and they’re going to be the same for every class. They are ‘The Presentation’, ‘The Practice’ and ‘The Production’ and ‘The Resolution’.

So these four ‘Acts’ that make up class structure.

During the presentation we want to connect with our students and give them time to connect with themselves. We will introduce the theme of the class and draw our students attention to the parts of their body they will be focusing on and or the qualities of the elemental class type. We will probably include instruction in pranayama and some kind of modified version of the actions they will need in the peak pose. By the end of act one we want our students to be warmed up, fully attentive to their practice and prepared to work deeper into the areas we have identified.

The second act, the practice, is about isolating the muscles and structures we need to enter our peak pose. We will discuss the principle of sequencing in more detail in our next section, but briefly. Proceed from simple to complex. Increase intensity gradually. Balance action with counter-actions. And don’t be afraid to repeat yourself. By the end of the second act, we want our students to be at their peak in terms of limberness and strength, fully prepared for the ‘climax’ of the class.

The third act of class is the production. The production represents the peak of our class’s complexity. Producing a pose means transitioning in and out of the posture smoothly and safely. We want to give the students enough time to give the pose their best effort. This act will also include the necessary counter-poses to balance out the effort of the peak pose.

The last and nominal act is the conclusion. This part of class includes any closing postures, meditation, pranayama practice and savasana. It also includes the time spent closing the class, and any additional time needed to answer questions or say goodbye.

So those are the ‘Acts’ that make up every class. Presentation, Practice and Production. Next we’ll discuss in more detail the ‘scenes’ and that make up the meat and potatoes of our class.

Transcript:

So, we’ve covered the ‘Acts’ that make up a class. Those acts are basically the same for every class. The scenes within those acts however may vary a great deal. This is the part of your class planning process where you can really express your creativity and authenticity. To that end, I want to avoid imposing too much rigid structure on your class plan at this point.

In this lesson we’re going to cover a few guidelines for planning out the scenes of your class. You’re never going to have the chance to teach your students everything in one class. So what you choose to include in your class is as important as what you choose to leave out. For every posture you include in your class, imagine answering the question, ‘How does this relate to the theme of my class?’

Ok, so beyond that, here are some general guiding principles for planning a class:

Number one. Move from simple to complex. Do simple poses first, then complex poses. Let’s break this down a bit further. There are three ways that I increase or decrease the complexity of a posture. By adding or removing stability. By increasing or decreasing the distance from Tadasana. And by dissecting the pose into isolated movements.

Let’s look at Natarajasana as an example. There are three ways I can make this pose simpler. I can add stability by having the student use the wall for support, or perhaps having them do the same pose while prone on the floor. True, that brings a little bit of a different flavor to the pose, but it is still working with the same muscles and structures. I can bring the pose closer to a neutral tadasana shape by giving them a strap to connect their hand to their foot. Or I can break the pose down into isolated movements by doing one pose focusing on hip extension and another pose focusing on shoulder extension.

So, start simple, then go complex. If you’re not sure how to make a pose simpler, add stability, bring it closer to a neutral tadasana or break it down to isolated movements.

That brings us to point number two. In some ways this is related to point number two. That is, Increase and decrease the ‘effort’ of the class gradually.

One way to do so is by grouping asanas of the same family together. Level changing, or moving from sitting to standing to lying down to hands and knees is often taken for granted by yoga teachers who change levels without thinking twice. But transitioning between families of asanas often takes out students more time and effort than we expect. Grouping families of asanas together is one way of avoiding that.

I don’t want to go so far as to say don’t mix asanas from different families together because there are certainly some transitions worth practicing. But if you do, just be clear about how it changes the effort of the class. A scene that has a standing pose followed by a sitting pose, followed by another standing pose and then a prone pose tends to feel sloppy and random if there is not a clear reason for doing so.

Alright, number three. Limit new material. Try to remember learning math. Did you learn addition, subtraction, multiplication and division all in one class? No of course not. You eventually may have used them all in the same class, but as new concepts they were introduced one at a time.

Because it takes a while for new material to be integrated into somebody’s practice, try to limit the amount of new material you include in your class. If you’re teaching new students this is sometimes difficult since everything is new material. For these students it is especially helpful to explain at the beginning of class what to focus on and repeat at the end of class what they should remember.

And very important, principle number four. Action to counteraction. We laid out in our class theme the movements we are going to focus on. Does that mean that those are the only movements we are going to practice? No. A well thought out class includes both the action and (at least a little bit) of the counteraction. As a general rule, pair the action/ counteractions like this:

Lateral rotation and Medial Rotation

Flexion and Extension

Adduction and Abduction

Backbending, Forward Bending and Twisting

I try to follow the eighty twenty rule for action to counteraction. If for example lateral rotation is my focus, at least twenty percent of my class should include some medial rotation. These are of course rough estimates.

And finally, principles of sequencing number five. Repetition, repetition, repetition. Nobody ever learned anything by doing it once. Yoga is no different. Expect your students to practice the movements you are teaching again and again. Choose poses for your sequence that give your students the opportunity to practice the target movement in a variety of anasa families. For example, if you are focusing on abduction and lateral rotation of hips, practice those movements in standing poses, in sitting poses, in supine poses. You get the idea.

Transcript:

So, those were some general principles for choosing which postures to include in your class. But without some organization, we’ll end up with a long, unreadable laundry list of postures.

These are some suggestions for how to organize your thoughts as you’re writing up your lesson plan.

Number one. Start by writing the name of the scene, then fill in the poses. If nothing comes to mind, you can just call the scene by the dominant family of asanas and the movement you are focusing on. For example, Standing Hip Abduction or Prone Backbends.

Number two. Choose the poses you’re going to include in the scene. I recommend limiting the number of poses in a scene. The exact number of poses in a scene that’s right for you is something you’ll need to work out. I don’t usually include more than seven. Remember, all of this organization is for your own benefit. If you write a super long scene just remember that you’ll have to either memorize it or quickly reference your notes. Make your life easy and write short scenes.

Number three. And, as a corollary to number two, I’ve found it very helpful to develop a shorthand style of writing down the names of poses. For example SPG instead of Supta Padagustasana. Some people like to draw stick figures, if that works for you, that’s fine. So long as you are able to interpret your notes at a glance your system is good.

Number four. In the notes section of the template, jot down anything important for the scene. This might include important cues you plan to give, special modifications you plan to use etc. cetera. Anything that tells you how you are going to practice the poses in the scene belongs here.

Number five. In the time section of the template, write down how long you plan to spend on each Act. If you are struggling with timing your classes you can even note how long you want to take with each scene. My advice here: Don’t cheat yourself out of a strong finish. For this, I recommend figuring how long you need to end the class and have enough time for pranayama, meditation and savasana and work backwards from there. Know that it will take you longer to teach the poses than it will for you to practice the poses and if your student is a beginner, it will take even longer.

Alright, and point number six, challenge the students but don’t overwhelm them. Again, I generally follow the eighty twenty rule. I want my students to be able to do eighty percent of the poses and struggle with twenty percent.

After you’ve planned out the poses don’t neglect to run through the sequence on your own. Ask yourself, ‘Does this make sense to me?’ ‘Is this the way I would practice?’ ‘How would I feel taking this class?

If you had to chart this class on the x-y graph of action and mobility would it match the profile you are aiming for?

And a final word on sequencing, keep it simple. Don’t worry about designing a beautiful and intricate choreography of poses and transitions. Focus on functionality. For every pose ask yourself, ‘How does this relate to my theme? How does this further my goals?’ That’s not to say that classes with complex choreography can’t also be functional. But they are functional despite their complexity, not because of it.

Transcript:

So, one thing that I haven’t covered yet in any of this sequencing material is the inclusion of pranayama and meditation. Certainly these are important elements to a complete yoga class, but I have less objective instruction to give regarding how and when to include them.

As a general rule, the more subtle elements of the yoga practice are a more personal expression of how you practice. How you address the practice beyond the nuts and bolts of alignment and sequencing will become like your unique signature. Like with asanas, I’m going to assume that you already have some kind of pranayama and meditation experience and I’m not going to go into detail about how to practice specific pranayama or meditation exercises.

Before planning what pranayama and meditation exercises to include, take some time to reflect on what kinds of pranayama and meditation you are familiar with and how you learned them.

Whichever one you know and practice, instruct those. Beyond that, I only have some basic suggestions for how to organize your thoughts and instructions.

First, instruct breathing at the beginning of class and give students reminders. Even if you plan to do a longer pranayama practice at the end of class, try to include at least some mention of how to breath during the ‘Presentation’ act. This is especially important for beginning students.

And Second, Think broadly about what kind of meditation you practice. Buddhist literature makes what I think is a useful distinction between ‘Vipassana’ style meditation and ‘Samatha’ style meditation.

‘Samatha’ meditations focus attention on concepts, for example counting the breath. Numbers are not physical, actual things, they are concepts. Samatha meditation is useful in calming the mind.

‘Vipassana’ meditations on the other hand empty the mind by focusing the attention on actual physical reality, for example the physical sensation of the breath passing through the nose. The air passing through the nostrils is part of physical reality and we empty the mind by focusing on what ACTUALLY IS.

So, give some thought as to what general style of meditation you are familiar with and unless you are an accomplished meditator with experience in both of these domains, teach what you know and stick with it. Honestly, you students will be much better served by you holding the space for them to dive deep into one meditation than a buffet style new meditation every week.

Transcript:

Ok, so we’ve talked about the general principles of planning a class and looked at some sample lessons of all four elemental types. I want to mention one last thing before we close this module, that regards thinking of classes in the long term.

When I started out as a teacher I made a different lesson for every class. It was time consuming and honestly not helpful for my students. Don’t be like that. Instead, think about each individual class as a part of a long term program. Like I mentioned, what you choose to include in your class is as important as what you choose to exclude. When you begin thinking in terms of weeks instead of minutes, you’ll find that you have a lot more freedom to explore the practice in depth and are under a lot less pressure to fit everything you feel is important into a single session.

My recommendation is to write a lesson plan and teach it for about two weeks before moving onto the next lesson plan. For those two weeks keep about eighty percent of your lesson plan constant and change up about twenty percent day to day to keep it interesting.

If taking a curriculum approach is new to you, start with a three or four lesson plan curriculum to be taught over six to eight weeks. Here’s how I suggest you do it.

Return to the utkatasana assessment regularly

If you are working with an individual, reassess utkatasana every couple weeks and return to the priority of imbalances. That is, first address the most debilitating imbalances, next work with structures that are asymmetrical, then with whatever imbalance is the most dramatic, and finally, from the ground up. After two weeks of working with the most debilitating imbalance, write a lesson plan for addressing asymmetry or dramatic imbalances.

Alternatively, if you want to get started with a color by numbers curriculum, you can structure you lessons plans like this:

Lesson Plan One: Standing, Balance and Hip Abduction Poses focusing on energetic grounding

Lesson Plan Two: Corework, Quadruped poses and Backbends focusing on energetic expansion

Lesson Plan Three: Forward Folds, Twists and Inversions focusing on energetic balancing.

This breakdown of classes has worked for me but is by no means the only way to structure your curriculum. However you decide to pursue your curriculum, try to spend time with all families of asanas.

Ok, so this brings us to the end of our module on Planning our lesson. In our next section we’re going to look at how to implement what we have so carefully constructed and the many ways things can fail to go according to plan.

Transcript:

So, Welcome to module four. In this module we will be focusing on the strategies you will be using when you step in the classroom, lesson plan in hand.

We’re going to cover how to set up your classroom, how to give clear instructions, making the decision about when and how to correct students and how to modify your teaching practice if you are teaching online.

Let’s jump in.

In this first lesson, we’re going to talk about teaching yoga online. Honestly, I wasn’t sure where exactly this section would fit best. But since everything up to this point will basically be the same whether you are teaching online or in person, I thought we’d start it here.

So, teaching online. There is a good chance you are curious about teaching online and the way the world of yoga is heading. I think online classes are now going to be a permanent fixture of the yoga world. I’ve taught both online and in person classes and taken both online and in person classes. My conclusion is that it is not only possible to learn yoga online, online classes actually have some advantages to in-person classes.

When I ask my students about taking classes online the main detractors that I hear from them are one, that they don’t feel the same motivation without the in person group setting of an in person class and two, they don’t think they can get the same quality of teaching they get in an in-person class.

To the first point, well sure. If socializing face to face is an important part of the reason you are coming to yoga class, then probably taking online lessons isn’t something you’ll be interested in. But there is a good chance that your students actually are interested in learning how to practice yoga in addition to socializing with their friends. In that case, they may be open to trying online classes.

I think there are a lot of good reasons to take an online class. You can share these with your students and prove to them that online instruction can be as effective as practicing face to face.

So, why as a student might you want to take an online class? The immediate reason that comes to my mind is that practicing at home is an important psychological step towards independence. One of the best things about yoga is that you don’t need to be in a room full of special equipment. And yet, I’m consistently surprised by the number of students who only practice at the studio. I always emphasize to my students that they need to make an effort to guide their own practice to get the full benefit of yoga. Taking classes online, can be an important intermediate step for a lot of these students and online classes would be worth doing for this reason alone.

Beyond that, taking classes online opens up some tools for our students that were unavailable in person. Specifically, the readily available visual feedback of practicing in front of a camera. Now, I know a lot of teachers don’t like practicing in front of a mirror or camera because it fuels the ego or makes the practice too body-centered. That’s fine. If you emphasize alignment in your classes like me, I have found that being able to see your posture as helpful. But I get it, mirrors aren’t everyone’s gig. As a compromise, and something you can only do with online classes, it is to ask your student’s permission to take a screenshot of their posture, use MS paint or whatever basic photo editing software to draw notes directly on their pose. This way your students can draw their focus inward during class and still receive the benefit of visual feedback for their alignment.

Finally, taking classes online may be the step your student needs to make their home more conducive to yogic living. If it’s not socializing, the next biggest reason I hear from students for not practicing at home is, ‘My home isn’t as relaxing as the yoga studio.’ And, that’s fair. I get that people have kids or pets or other distractions around their homes that might prevent them from practicing. But that’s something to work with, not to ignore. I’d like to think that even the most hectic home can be prepared for yoga. Where else are your students likely to need it most right?

So, if your students are truly interested in learning how to practice yoga and not just coming to class to socialize with friends or escape their kids, hopefully you’ll be able to stoke that fire with some enthusiastic recommendations for practicing online. If not, there are more than a few online platforms for connecting teachers to students. See resources for a short list.

Transcript:

Ok, so assuming you’ve found some students to take an online class with you, we want to make sure that we give them the best experience possible. Highly functional does not necessarily mean high production value. When taking a live, online class, I’ve found that what students care about is that you are paying attention to them. Once they can see you and hear you, added production value doesn’t make your class any more functional. If you’re not planning on recording your lesson, you don’t need to drop a bunch of money on equipment. You can get by with minimal investment and using things you probably already have access to.

So, equipment wise, here is what you’ll need.

One: A camera. This can be on your phone, your laptop, or if you have a DSLR, then why not. More important than the kind of camera you have is the height of the camera. I’ve found placing the camera somewhere between the navel and chest gives me the best angle for the full body. If you’re using your phone, you will need to get a trip-pod, if you have a laptop, maybe a desk or stool. Your guiding rule here is ‘Can my students see me? Can I see my students?’ To that end phone users will want to use the camera on the front of the phone so the screen points forward where you can see it. Your most limiting factor with the camera will probably be finding a space to set up. You need to find a space that is large enough that you can capture your whole body.

Two. A bluetooth headset. Apple airpods are great, but anything that picks up your voice and stays out of your way will work. The important thing is that your students will be able to hear you when you step away from your camera or turn your back.

Three. Lights. If you’re in a brightly lit room this might not even be an issue. If lighting is an issue you can probably fix it with a couple portable clamp lights or desk lights, neither of which will cost you more than ten or fifteen dollars a piece. Place one light behind the camera to light up your face and one off to the side of the camera to reduce shadows.

Four. Video software. I use zoom and have been pretty happy with it. The free version lets you teach one on one classes for as long as you want. If you add more people your class time will be limited. I’m sure skype, facetime and google meet are all perfectly functional as well though I don’t have as much experience with these.

If you have these you’re ready to get started.

Transcript:

The last word I have on teaching online are some tips for making your teaching effective. Teaching online does take some adjusting of your strategy, but just keeping these few things in mind will make transitioning from in person to online classes smoother.

One: It’s okay to ask your students to adjust their camera. There is a good chance that your student will not be able to fit their whole body in front of their camera. For that reason, make a note in your lesson plan which part of their body you need to see and ask your students to adjust their camera accordingly.

Two: The Follow the leader model is not always the best choice. That is, if you normally demonstrate while instructing your students, you might find that poses where you or your students face away from the camera present extra difficulties. Instead, consider the monkey see monkey do model. Ask your students to watch first, then talk them through it. It will mean more demonstrating and you may not cover as much material. But still, an effective teaching strategy.

Three: Explore the space. I use three ‘frame settings’ for my class. The full body frame, the mid-frame and the close-up frame. For standing poses or sun salutation you’ll find the full-body frame the best choice. For more detailed instructions like how to grip the hands or hold a mudra the close-up frame is the best choice. The point is that you don’t need to feel glued to your mat while you are teaching.

Beyond that, the strategies for teaching effective yoga classes will be the same whether you are teaching online or in person. The next section we will dive into more details about delivering your lesson.

Transcript:

As a teacher, cueing is really where the rubber meets the road. You can have the most detailed and complete lesson plan and asana analysis, but none of that makes a bit of difference if you can’t communicate that to your students. I see a lot of new teachers struggle with cueing either getting tongue tied, rattling off a rapid list of memorized alignments or simply exhausting themselves trying to demonstrate every single pose for their students. But, if we’ve put in the work to prepare, this process doesn’t need to be either mysterious or complicated.

To make things easy on yourself, follow this protocol.

Cue.

Observe.

Correct.

Demonstrate.

Adjust or Modify.

We’ll go over each of these in more detail, but let's start with giving cues.

Giving good cues doesn’t mean just reciting a list of alignments you learned for a pose. It means looking at your student and giving them only the cues they need. That takes more skill than reciting a memorized list, but it doesn’t need to be complicated. Here’s how I think about it.

First, we want to organize our cues from coarse to subtle. Basically that means first giving cues to guide our students into the general shape of the posture. Then do some fine tuning with cues regarding movement and engagement. And finally, flesh out the experience of the practice by giving some cue about where to put the attention, or what kind of attitude to invite. Coarse to subtle.

Luckily, our asana analysis is ready to go and already set up to make giving cues easy. Use the ‘Key Movement’ section from the Asana Analysis to instruct the movements and engagement of the Legs and Hips, the Spine and Pelvis, and the Arms and Shoulders.

Before we go any further, I should point out the difference between a movement and an engagement. A movement is a joint action, an engagement is a muscle action, we can engage the muscles without necessarily moving much the joints. As a general rule, moving from coarse to subtle, first we want to instruct movements, then engagements. If you’re fine tuning the engagement of a pose, make sure that distinction is clear to your students. For example, in cobra pose we might try to focus our students on the engagement of the lower trapezius by telling them to ‘pull their hands back’. We would want to make sure they understand that their hands stay where they are and this is an engagement, not a movement.

So, use as many of these ‘Coarse Instructions’ as you need to find the general shape then fine tune the pose to your satisfaction. But once your students seem to have it, avoid rattling off instructions needlessly. I’ve found that three instructions tends to be the limit for what most students can concentrate on at a time. If you feel like your students need more than what you can say in three cues, consider practicing the pose twice.

Once we are satisfied the students are practicing well and safely, subtle instructions will convey an experience of the pose. We might draw our students attention to the breath. Or the balance of energy. We might ask them to feel for the focal point and foundation. Or present them with creative imagery to awaken a new experience in their body. Again, our Asana Analysis can help us here. Ask yourself, ‘How do I feel when practicing this pose? Why are we practicing it?’

Transcript:

So we want to organize our cues from coarse to subtle. The next tip for giving clear cues is to format your cues in ABCD format. That is ‘Action, Bodypart, Clear Direction’.

For example, ‘Step, Your Feet, Hip Distance Apart’. This works equally well for subtle cues, though you may need to get creative. For example ‘Feel, The Weight of Your Hips, Center Over the Arches of Your Feet’ or ‘Draw, Your energy, From your Sacrum up to the Crown of your head’.

Now, what exactly qualifies as a ‘clear direction’ will vary widely depending on the student's experience. Newer students will need more directions whereas more experienced students may understand the names of poses as sufficient direction.

For example, to practice Warrior one a new student might need to be told.

‘Hinge at the hips and bend the knees until you can put your hands flat on the ground’

Step the right foot to the back of your mat and spin your heel to the floor’

‘Raise your chest up over your hips and straighten your arms over your head.’

Where as an experienced student might need just one, ‘Fold forward and step the right foot back into warrior one’.

So, don’t speak in riddles. Make your instructions clear with actionable cues.

My last tip regarding cues relates to how to use repetition during your class. Repetition is good. Whether it is repetition within the same class or repetition day after day, we use repetition to gain fluency and proficiency. With regard to cues, we can use repetition to either to give more cues or to give fewer cues.

Let me give you an example. Suppose we are teaching a flowing, dynamic class somewhere on the northside of our chart and we are teaching a series of sun salutations. The first sun salutation we will need to instruct how to move in and out of every pose. But after the tenth repetition, we probably don’t need to give general instructions anymore and can just keep the breath count and let the students focus on flowing. Inhale up, Exhale down. Ect Repetition to give fewer cues.

On the other hand, suppose we are doing more static work somewhere on the southside of our chart and we are teaching downward facing dog. Should we have our students hold the pose while we give them a big long list of alignments? Probably not if we want to keep their attention. New students would absorb a fraction of what we are trying to tell them. Instead of trying to squeeze all of our instructions into one pose, why not repeat the pose and offer additional instructions in subsequent rounds.

So, to recap.

Prioritize your instructions from coarse to subtle. Give clear instructions in ABCD format. And, be mindful of how you are using repetition.

Transcript:

So, that’s the story of giving clear cues. Organize from coarse to subtle. Follow ‘Action, Bodypart, Clear Direction’ format. In flowing classing use repetition to give progressively less instruction and in static classes use repetition to give progressively more instruction.

But unless we’re teaching to an empty room, in addition to being clear with our cues we want to be receiving feedback from our students. We do this by being observant of how our students are practicing and by checking in with them periodically to make sure they understand what it is we are trying to teach.

Now, you’re thinking. But I thought we already did the observation back in Module One. Yes, we did. And we’re still observing. Specifically, we want to observe whether or not

One: whether or not the students are practicing safely and

Two: whether or not the students understand the instructions we are giving them.

Since we did already talk about observation, I’ll only add a few tips here for making that process easy while teaching.

Keep your eyes on the class. I see a lot of new teachers kind of just off in their own world while they are teaching. If you want to demonstrate something from the back, that's fine, but after, turn back around and make sure you students understand.

If you have a large class have your students lay their mats out in rows and stagger the columns so you can see the whole room in a glance. Circles and free form organization might satisfy your anti-establishment, free love mentality, but it sucks for teaching.

If you’re teaching on zoom, it's ok to tell your students to move their camera. Maybe they can’t, maybe they won’t. But if they want valuable feedback they should. Let them take some responsibility for their own education.

Walk around the room. (In the years before the pandemic people practiced yoga together in a room called a shala) Assuming that there isn’t a pandemic and neither you nor your students are not going to get sick, don’t feel trapped in the confines of your mat. You will see more if you are walking around and looking from different angles.

Transcript:

When observation alone is not enough to confirm that our students are understanding the material of the lesson, or if we want to reinforce some important point we may want to use check in with them verbally. A pause in class or a rest between scenes can be a convenient place to ask a quick concept checking question before moving on, or reinforcing important material.

Concept checking questions are short questions pertaining to the material we just covered with a simple one or two word answer. These questions both confirm for us that our students understood what we just taught and reinforce the important concepts from our lesson.

But, ‘Do you understand?’ is a sub-par concept checking question because it does not require students to demonstrate their understanding. Try to form your concept checking question by referring directly from a cue that we’ve recently given or the theme of our lesson. ‘Are your shoulders internally or externally rotating in this pose?’ or ‘Is the breath strong or soft in this transition?’ are better questions because they have specific, simple answers that relate to the material we’ve already covered.

Let’s look at some of our sample lessons for examples.

In our ‘Earth-Type’ class we are focusing on posterior tilting hips and working up to doing a one legged bridge. Probably, we will practice bridge pose more than once and while the students are resting in between sets I might ask them, ‘In bridge pose, what direction are the hips tilting?’ At this point in the lesson we will have covered the difference between anterior and posterior rotation and I will have told my students to posteriorly tilt their hips in bridge pose. If the students are paying attention, the answer is clear.

Let’s look at another one. In our ‘Air-Type’ class we are again focusing on posteriorly tilting hips, this time flowing from downward facing dog to a lunge. In our sequence we practice pulling the knee to the chest many different times and emphasize holding the exhale while doing so. Right before our peak scene I might ask my students, ‘Are we inhaling, exhaling or holding empty while stepping forward?’ If my students have been understanding the lesson so far they will know the answer.’

So, concept checking questions can be useful if it's not immediately obvious from our observation that the students understand what we are trying to teach them. Or we can use them to reinforce an important concept from our lesson theme. Our questions should not be tricky or complicated, we just want to quickly check in and make sure our students are on the same page.

Use concept questions sparingly or only when needed as they can eat up time and too many can break the tone of the class.

Transcript:

So, after giving a cue, the next step in our process is to observe whether our students followed said instruction. Did they follow the instructions? If yes, great, next instruction. If not, then it's time to consider offering corrective feedback.

The first question we have to ask is whether or not we should offer some kind of correction. We want to offer enough constructive feedback that our students know we are paying attention to them, but we don’t want to correct our students so much that they lose confidence.

That sweet spot of just the right amount of feedback is going to vary depending on the number of students we have in class. In larger groups of students, we will often find ourselves performing triage. There isn’t enough time to address every minor observation we might make so we have to prioritize who gets our attention.

Even in the largest groups, I make sure that

Nobody is doing anything unsafe

Everybody finds the general shape of the pose.

And, everybody is breathing.

In large groups, especially groups of new students, addressing those three priorities is often all time will allow. But as your students gain experience you’ll be able to dive into the more nuanced feedback. If we pass through those first three gates, then I start looking at

Minor corrections to foundation

Minor corrections related to the theme of the class

Other minor corrections.

In smaller groups or private lessons our feedback can be much more complete, but still we don’t want to overwhelm our students with corrections. Remember, try to limit your instructions to what the student can usefully focus on and absorb. It’s ok to repeat the pose to add detail.

Transcript:

So having decided that we should offer some kind of correction or feedback, our task then is to figure out how to do it. I recommend pursuing a plan of action that progressive from least time consuming to most time consuming. Here’s how that breaks down.

First we offer some general instructions to the whole class.

‘Step your right foot forward and open your chest and shoulders into warrior II’

We observe, and suppose we conclude that addressing the alignment of the knee would be appropriate.

Next, we offer a general verbal correction to the whole class.

‘Pull your right knee to the right until it’s over your ankle’

If I notice that a student didn’t pick up on the cue, then I offer a specific verbal correction calling the student by name.

‘Stacy, pull your right knee to the right’

Good clear verbal instructions in ABCD format will take you pretty far, especially if you can call your students by name. If time is short, unless the correction has to do with one of the first three priorities (doing something dangerous, not in the general shape of the pose, not breathing), then a specific verbal correction is often as far as I will pursue a correction.

But, suppose we are giving feedback with regards to one of those priorities or we have the bandwidth to pursue our correction in more detail. Maybe Stacy is off in her own world or just doesn’t understand what we are trying to tell her. In that case we need more direct intervention.

When telling our students what to do doesn’t work, we’ll need to show them. That is, offering either a tactile instruction or a demonstration. A tactile instruction is a physical indication of how to move. It could be pointing out on our students mat where to place their feet, a light touch indicating where to engage or offering our hand as a physical target for our students to reach towards. Even though our instruction is ‘tactile’ our students are still under their own motor control. We are not moving our student’s body for them.

A demonstration is another way we can show our students what we want them to do. Demonstrations fall into one of two kinds. ‘Follow-the-leader Demonstrations’ and ‘Monkey-see-monkey-do Demonstrations’

In ‘Follow-the-leader Demonstrations’, we demonstrate what we want our students to do as we are teaching. Our students watch and practice along with us. For many new teachers, this is the easiest way of teaching both because it is fairly effective in communicating what we want our students to do and because it is easier to remember cues if we do them ourselves. However, demonstrating every pose is exhausting and unsustainable if we are teaching full time. Get in the habit of using verbal instructions first and only demonstrating when those instructions aren’t enough.

In ‘Monkey-see-monkey-do Demonstrations’ we put class on pause, have our students watch as we demonstrate what to do, then instruct them through the pose we demonstrated. Monkey-see-monkey-do demonstrations are effective and informative, but time consuming. In a group class, I only do these if several of the students will benefit from pausing to take notes.

My last resort for offering a correction is to give a physical adjustment or a modification. We’re going to talk about physical adjustments in more detail in the next lesson, but for now I’ll just say that as a correction, your physical adjustment should precede from the instruction you were trying to give. That is, if your instruction was to pull the knee laterally, your adjustment should help the student do just that.

As an alternative to physically adjusting your student, you can offer them a modification. Remember, there are essentially three ways to modify a pose. We can increase the stability of the pose with a prop, the more contact we have with the ground the more stable we are. We can bring the pose closer to tadasana, the closer to tadasana the more neutral our pose is. And we can dissect the pose into discrete actions. For example stretching the calves, then the hamstrings instead of stretching the calves and hamstrings together. Using one or some combination of these three methods we can find a modification appropriate for any student, but coming up with modifications of the spot can be difficult. It’s worth spending some time in the planning phase to think about how you would modify poses you expect to be challenging.

So, that is the order of operations that I use when I am offering feedback.

General correction directed to the class

Specific correction directed to the individual

A tactile instruction or demonstration

Then an adjustment or modification

It goes without saying that if you are teaching online then tactile instructions and adjustment are right out. Instead, offer demonstrations and modified postures.

And just some final words about feedback.

It’s okay to give corrections at the end of class. If you’re teaching group classes, the time and pace of your class may not allow the kind of detailed feedback a student needs. If corrections you want to give can wait, consider talking to your student after class.

Also, don’t give corrections without positive reinforcement. If you tell your students to correct something, then also tell them when they get it right or at least when they are moving in the direction of improvement.

Transcript:

I mentioned two different kinds of demonstrations. We looked at where in our teaching process to use these demonstrations but didn’t spend a lot of time talking about how to use them.

So we have two different kinds of demonstration models. The Follow-the-Leader model where our students are practicing with us concurrently and the Monkey-see-monkey-do model where our students first watch then practice. For both of these types of demonstrations we want to be informative without being overwhelming. That means demonstrating no more and no less than what we can reasonably expect our students to do.

It’s common to use the follow-the-leader model frequently throughout class, but if you are choosing to practice the poses while you are instructing them don’t confuse yourself into thinking that this is your practice time as well. Let me give an example from when I was starting out as a teacher. I would often include upavista konasana, a wide legged forward fold, in my sequence. In the full version of this pose the chest comes to rest on the ground between the legs and that is how I would demonstrate the pose while instructing it. The problem was, none of the students I was teaching at the time were anywhere close to bringing their chest to the ground. Not only was putting my chest on the ground confusing the intention of the pose, it resulted in poor alignment and disheartened students.

While you’re demonstrating, keep your personal limitations to yourself and only demonstrate as the pose or variation of the pose your students can reasonably practice.

While teaching a pose, your students don’t need to know everything you could possibly tell them about. This is true all the time, but tends to be especially a problem while using Monkey-see-monkey-do demonstrations. If you students are watching a demonstration of trikonasana for example, they don’t need a dissertation on all of the poses' complexity. Keep your demonstration short and to the point. I follow this protocol. Demonstrate the pose and give the three cues you want your students to focus on. Finish demonstrating and repeat the cues. Then return to practice and guide your students through the pose using the same three cues. Simple.

The last point I want to mention about demonstrations is not exactly related to teaching technique but still very important. In the world of yoga where power dynamics between students and teachers unfortunately seems to invite abuse we as teachers have to ask ourselves if demonstrating puts us in a dominant relationship over our students. The next time you are demonstrating a pose, be honest with yourself and ask if having greater strength, flexibility or skill than your students makes you feel good about yourself. How would you feel about a student having greater strength or skill than you? How would you feel about a student choosing rest instead of doing the pose you were teaching?

These are important questions to think about. Assuming the role of a teacher is inherently a role with power. We should always be asking ourselves how that power is affecting us and what we are doing with it.

Ok teachers, here we are finally talking about manually adjustments. For some reason this seems to be a divisive topic in the world of yoga. So, just keep in mind this is my opinion. You’re welcome to disagree. I only ask that you think about this subject and come to a decision mindfully.

So, what is my opinion on manual adjustments? Honestly, I think you can do away with them entirely. That is, giving manual adjustments is not a requirement for being a yoga teacher. If you’re not comfortable giving adjustments, I think it’s totally fine to stick with offering demonstrations and modifications. When I’m teaching, I’ll very rarely give manual adjustments and only as an instrument for instruction or correcting form. I don’t give adjustments just to make my students feel good.

Unfortunately, online videos are not an excellent format for learning how to give manual adjustments. I’m also not much of a fan of memorizing lists. I feel strongly that giving manual adjustments should evolve out of a teacher's ingrained and intuitive knowledge of kinesiology and the posture they are adjusting, not from a memorized list of adjustments to give for a specific pose. In any case, there are already plenty of videos on youtube of what adjustments to give. Here, we’re going to cover some important considerations if you decide that manual adjustments are something you will offer your students.

Informed Consent. Right at the top of the list is the importance of informed consent from our student to touch and move their body. That doesn’t just mean having our students permission. It means that our student understands the adjustment we intend to perform, the reason for the adjustment, our qualification for offering the adjustment and alternatives to the adjustment. Yoga teachers as a profession are not licensed to touch their clients nor are they qualified to diagnose or treat any condition a student might have. Informed consent means that our students understand this and give permission voluntarily, not under the duress that they accede to the adjustment.

How you go about getting the informed consent of your students is up to you. You can talk with your students before class or before the adjustment. But do make sure your student knows what you plan to do before you do it. It’s one thing to give your teacher permission to adjust you, but you might feel differently if you knew that the adjustment involved lying down on top of you or placing their hands on your inner thighs.

That leads us to our second consideration, quality of touch. It should be clear from the way you touch your students what your intention is. Think about sinking your touch all the way to your students bones without squeezing or pressing. A firm and purposeful touch inspires confidence and trust in your ability, whereas a limp wandering hand is uncomfortable. Developing a good quality of touch takes time. If you are close with other teachers or experienced students, ask to practice with them and get feedback.

Sinking our touch to the bones of the student means that we are becoming part of the structure of their pose. That means own stability is essential. The third consideration is our own bio-mechanics as we are adjusting the student. As a rule of thumb, don’t use any pose to adjust your students that you wouldn’t want them to practice. That is to say, don’t make your posture poor in order to help a student with their posture. Keep your spine straight and the weight of your body centered over your foundation. Apply force by leaning your bodyweight into or against your students and not by pushing or pulling with the upper body.

If we are applying force to our students body we must have a strong understanding of active and passive range of motion and be able to feel the end range of a joint. Unfortunately, that’s not something I can really teach through a video. But this is the basic idea. Joints have an active range of motion (how far we can move them with the muscles that cross the joint) and a passive range of motion, (how far we can move when we apply additional force to a joint). The wrist is a good example of this. Extend your wrist as far as you can (that’s active range of motion). Then use your other hand to pull your fingers back a little more (that’s passive range of motion).

If we are giving an adjustment that moves a student deeper into a pose than they could do on their own we are moving the student’s joint from an active to a passive range of motion. The end of each range of motion of any given joint is limited from further movement by different structures. Muscles, fat, tendons, cartilage, bones etc feel different when we take a joint to its end range of motion and to adjust our students safely we must be able to identify the different end range feels.

Practice identifying three different end range feels for passive range of motion.

Soft, as in when you flex your knee. The muscles and fat of the calf and thigh usually stop us from fully flexing our knee, but we can get a little more range of motion by sitting on our heels. Squishing the muscles and fat of the back of the leg has a soft end range feel.

Firm, as when you flex your hip to raise a straight leg. Tension in the hamstrings prevent us from further flexing our hip, but if we brace our leg and fold into it as in a standing forward fold we can work into a passive range of motion. The range of motion is firmer that a soft end feel, but still yielding.

Hard, as when you extend your elbow. The bones in the elbow joint meet and prevent any further movement. Additional force into the elbow joint yields no movement and only risks stress or injury.

It is one thing to experience these different end feels on ourselves and quite another when we are moving the joints of somebody else’s body. Knowing the normal range of motion for the joints we want to adjust and being able to identify the end range feels are essential skills for teachers who want to adjust their students into poses that they can’t get to on their own. But all bodies are different and I can’t categorically say this joint has so many degrees of range of motion and such and such a feel. If you want these kinds of adjustment to be part of your repertoire as a teacher, then I recommend additional training in person where you can feel these end ranges for yourself and practice adjustments under the supervision of somebody who has experience.

Alright, so that’s all I have to say about manual adjustments. Better to err on the side of caution. Don’t give adjustments if you don’t know what you’re doing and never feel obligated to give your students adjustments. Your students can learn how to practice yoga just fine without them and ultimately, they’ll learn independence and self-reliance along the way.

Transcript:

My last note on reflecting on the class you just taught is more about how you view yourself as a teacher.

Review your lesson honestly and with self-compassion. It is okay to feel good for a job well done, it’s okay to recognize the errors you make. In fact, reflecting on our past and cringing a little bit inside is a sign of growth.

But don’t let your performance in class (good or bad) become commensurate with your sense of self worth as a teacher. All of us are going to have good days and bad days. Classes where we get tongue tied, make errors in judgment or where nobody shows up,’ and we’ll have classes when everything seems to come together. It's natural and something beyond our control to some degree. If our sense of self worth as teachers remains tied to things beyond our control, we’re at the mercy of circumstance.

When I began teaching yoga I can remember a persistent sense of self doubt. Despite years of practice and having a well-developed asana practice I was sure that my students and other yoga teachers could see right through me. I felt like a fraud, that I didn’t know anything about ‘real yoga’. Anytime I flubbed a class it was evidence that I didn’t know what I was doing and anytime a student made genuine progress in my class it was despite of, not because of my help.

I’d like to think that I’ve matured as a teacher since those early classes. Not because I now feel like an expert with nothing left to learn, but because I’ve learned how to recognize and deal with those feelings of self-doubt. I think that my experiences of feeling like a fraud are common to many new yoga teachers and even many experienced teachers. And at least in my case, the solution has been not how to avoid feelings of inadequacy all together, but how to deal with them and not let them rule my life.

These are some of the self-reflection strategies that I use to deal with self-doubt when I feel like the world of yoga would do better without me.

Step One: Observe the thoughts and emotions

Identify the thoughts going through your head by writing them down. Then write down how you feel about these thoughts.

Step Two: Identify the cause of the thoughts

What are the facts? What happened to make you feel the way you do? Are you comparing yourself to somebody you saw on Instagram? Are you judging your inability to put your foot behind your head while speaking Sanskrit? Write down the hard facts that you are reacting to.

You can do step one and two together in a simple ‘I’ statement:

“I feel _____ and think _____ when I observe that _______.”

Step Three: Judge for yourself the truth and value of this thought

We often jump to conclusions and react without first considering the situation objectively. Would anybody react the same way? Is there no other way to react to what you observe?

Ask yourself if this thought hinders or helps you.

Step Four: Reframe the narrative as an opportunity for growth and acceptance.

Making mistakes is natural and human. Instead of expecting perfection from yourself, use your observation as an opportunity to accept where you are now and focus your efforts of self growth. Accept that becoming a yoga teacher is a lifelong process. The fact that this process is ongoing is not a reason to avoid doing your best today.

Be humble in your teaching, but honor the work and study that you have already put into your growth.

Transcript:

In addition to reviewing the specifics of our teaching strategy at the end of our lesson, it is also important to periodically consider our practice as a whole.

What does yoga mean to me?

As you grow and change as a teacher and practitioner your yoga practice will grow and change as well. Take some time to dwell on what the practice means to you and return to this question regularly.

The best way to maintain an authentic connection to the yoga you are teaching is to maintain a personal practice. This can seem like a harsh rule, but I don’t recommend that anybody who doesn’t have a personal practice start teaching. My rule of thumb is don’t teach on the weeks that you don’t practice.

What makes me unique as a teacher?

I know that many teachers, even after years of experience, struggle to identify their unique qualities. Don’t start this inquiry by wondering how you are different from every other teacher out there. Instead, focus on the aspects and elements of the practice that really resonate with you, what you do well. For example, if you love the philosophical elements of yoga that's a great place to start. It’s totally fine if there are other teachers out there with more knowledge and experience in yoga philosophy. Focus on what’s important to you. How you share what you love is what makes you unique.

Who am I serving?

You will develop a niche as a teacher. The four elemental types of classes is a framework for organizing the variety and styles of classes available in yoga today. It’s not imperative that you specialize in all four types. As you gain experience you may find yourself gravitating to one or another quadrant. Use this as a tool for exploring possible niches for your teaching.

Alright, the last reflection exercise I have to share with you is pretty simple and one you may have done before. That is taking time to check back in with the yamas and the niyamas occasionally and using them as a guide for self-inquiry. I’ve found the principles in the first two limbs of yoga to be relevant not just for practitioners, but for teachers as well.