Meditation

• 1). Introduce Eastern meditation at the beginning of every class. Clear an area of the classroom where children can place yoga mats in a circle for their early-morning meditation. Practicing a 20-minute meditative state helps children concentrate on their Western academics.
  
  
• 2). Explain to the children what meditation is and how it is about focusing on their present state. Explain to them that focusing on their presence for 10 to 20 minutes helps them to be aware and concentrate more on their studies throughout the day.
  
  
• 3). Ask children to sit or lie comfortably with their eyes closed for 20 minutes. Play a meditative CD softly as you help the children enter their meditative state. Explain that you will count to 10 and as you are counting they should start focusing on their presence. Help the children enter their meditative state further after your count by giving them a creative visualization. Ask them to visualize a door, walk through it and see the ocean. Tell them they are walking the beach and listening to the ocean sounds and smells. Make your voice progressively quieter untill you stop talking altogether as you help children with their visualization.
  
  
• 4). Tell students you are going to slowly count to 10, after which they should open their eyes and come out of the meditation. Begin counting to 10. Wait a minute or two for the children to become aware of their surroundings. Continue with classes as you normally do.
  
  

Yoga

• 1). Introduce a few yoga exercises in your mid-morning curriculum. Ask children to bring a yoga mat to class and place them about 12 inches from each other on the classroom floor. Have children sit cross-legged on their mat and start basic yoga breathing exercises. Explain that on the stretch, you inhale and exhale when you relax.
  
  
• 2). Show children how to stretch to the moon by sitting on their mat in a cross-legged position. Ask them to interlacing their fingers and raise their hands as far as possible over their heads, stretching as far as they can. Have them bend their heads down until they touch their crossed legs or are as close as possible, while at the same time lowering their outstretched arms to the floor.
  
  
• 3). Teach the class the Sunrise-Sunset pose. Have students stand tall and inhale and exhale deeply three to five times. On an inhale, have them lift their arms high above their head and press their feet down towards the center of the earth. Have them exhale and relax, then stretch their arms downward toward the ground on the next inhale.
  
  
• 4). Perform the tree exercise. Ask students to stand up straight and tall, pushing their legs toward the ground and their head and arms toward the sky. Have them look at just one point in front of them, keeping their eyes steady. Lift a right leg and touch the left leg as close to the knee as possible. Ask the children to imagine roots growing from their left leg to the ground. Expect children to lose their balance when first practicing this exercise.
  
  
• 5). Practice several of these types of stretches and end the 10-to-20 minute yoga class with three to five minutes of meditation.