One of the best things about being a kids yoga teacher is coming up with creative lessons!

I have been having lots of fun in my yoga classes experimenting with some new props and yoga resources.

This week, I was excited to try out my new Rainbow Kids ABC Play Cards, which I bought online on the Rainbow Kids Yoga website!

ABC Yoga is a great way for kids to learn about the alphabet AND explore yoga!

I introduced my lesson by asking:

Did you know we can use our bodies to make each letter of the alphabet?  I brought these very special cards for us to do some special ABC Yoga Poses.  Are you ready…what’s the first letter of the alphabet?

They all called out “A”!! and that’s where the fun began…

The A card was for ALIEN which is a modified DOWNWARD DOG, so I asked them what yoga pose it looked like and we started in Down Dog and lifted one arm to make the line across our “A”.  For some of the poses, such as BUTTERFLY, we did both the letter shape AND the actual yoga pose (Baddha Konasana).

The kids loved the whimsical illustrations on the cards (A for ALIEN, F for FLAMINGO, M for MERMAID, U for UNICORN)  and trying to guess what pose came next!

They also came up with other favorite yoga poses that began with some of the letters, including as CAT, DOG, FROG, LION and more!

After doing 26 yoga poses, they were more than ready for Savasana and now that the school year is almost over, I can see how much more relaxed and able to be still they are.  At the end of one of my classes, the children started singing the ABC’s song which warmed my heart because I know they enjoyed doing ABC YOGA!

Being a writer and word lover myself, the more I use books and other resources that reinforce literacy,  the more I appreciate being able to teach kids to develop a love of language, as well as yoga!