"Yoga helps create a safe space for students and teachers. By empowering an individual to feel balanced and strong within his or her own body, yoga enhances resilience. Through these practices many young people develop the capacity to reflect before acting, limiting impulsivity. Yoga promotes cooperation and creative thinking, improving learning readiness.
Yoga is self-rewarding in many ways. Most postures get easier with practice; the poses and breathing help many students feel more relaxed after just a few moments. The lessons provide teachers with tools for modeling compassionate interaction among students. Doing yoga makes the teacher feel better, too, and this spills over into the classroom experience for all.” - Louise Goldberg, “Classroom Yoga Breaks: Brief Exercises to Create Calm”
This book is an essential resource for any classroom teacher, absolutely packed with simple, powerful exercises and activities. It’s written in plain, accessible language, and addresses multiple related topics such as how yoga complements mindfulness training, physical education, and social emotional learning. Louise talks about the neuroscience behind why it’s effective (in a way we non-scientists can easily understand), and even gets into yoga as an antidote to bullying.
And Louise is just about the kindest, sweetest person you could ever hope to meet. Go get it!