Relax in Child's Pose and Sleep Like a Baby
/Feeling stressed and overwhelmed?
Want to take a break and find some peace and calm?
Need to quiet all the excess noise and listen for your inner voice?
Rest and Restore in Child’s Pose
Child’s Pose is a relaxing foundational pose that helps to stretch the hips, thighs, and ankles while reducing stress and fatigue. One of the most popular and frequently practiced yoga poses, it allows us to rest while drawing our attention inward to our body and breathing.
This pose relaxes the muscles of the front body while passively stretching the muscles of the back torso — and is totally kid-friendly!
Often used as a transition pose in between challenging poses or sequences, relaxation yoga poses are calming and grounding. The more we practice taking our bodies from exertion to relaxation, the easier it is to trigger our relaxation response when we need it in times of physical or emotional stress.
Practice Child’s Pose with children by pretending to be a seed about to sprout or a favorite baby animal sleeping. Try throwing in deep breathing and animal snoring to add some fun and release tension.
How To: Child’s Pose
Start on hands and knees in tabletop
Widen knees apart and keep big toes touching
Sit back toward your heels, resting your seat on your heels if you can
Drape your torso over your thighs
Rest your forehead on the floor
Keep arms long and extended, palms facing down
Relax upper and lower back
Breathe deeply and stay for at least one minute or longer
Tips for Mastering Child’s Pose:
If you have tight hips, your seat may not reach your heels. Use a blanket or block for support.
If your head does not reach the floor, place a block under your forehead or stack your hands into a pillow.
Take deep breaths into your sides and back. Our lungs expand in all directions - there is so much room to breathe!
Extend arms forward press palms into the floor, reach fingers forward for an active variation to open chest and shoulders
Kids Yoga Video: Try Child’s Pose with us!
Practice child's pose along with Dan by being a sleeping bunny and then waking up and hopping all around! Ask children to name other sleeping animals, write new verses together and then collaborate on how that animal moves when it wakes up!
Kid-friendly Variations for Child’s Pose:
Want to relax even more? Bring arms alongside the body with palms facing up to release tension in neck and shoulders. Partner up to compliment the forward fold of child’s pose with a heart-opening supported back bend.
Take deep breaths and notice how it feels to breathe together. Take turns bending forward and leaning back - tune in and listen closely and you will be able to sense when your partner is ready to switch.
We lead such busy lives and our kids are often over-scheduled, overstimulated, and overwhelmed. Learning Child’s Pose early and practicing often provides a great tool for kids to take a few quiet moments, tune in and self-soothe.
Sometimes we need to give ourselves permission or an excuse to slow down - do this with your children in classroom or at home and everyone wins!
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Help other educators and caregivers learn the benefits of Child’s Pose - and share it with your kids!
