Teaching large, mixed class

Yoga Teacher Training
#1

Hello everybody

I am new here and I hope I have put the thread the right place :slight_smile:

I have a problem that I hope you can help me out on.

I have recently started to teach yoga to a teakwondo club in my town. They train taekwondo several times each week, and one time every other week, I get the privilige to expand their horizon a tiny bit.

The problem is that the class is very large and there is a huge span in age. I think there are around 40 people and the ages go from around 10 to 50. I find it quite hard to keep everybodys attention for the 90 minutes that the classes last. Especially the kids can be quite unattentive at times. Last time I tried to spice it up a bit by trying to make them compete in how long they could hold the Plank. I worked somewhat, but I feel that it is not really the right way to go, as I think that competetion does not really belong in yoga. I have thought about cutting some time of the class and maybe make it 60 minutes long instead, but I also feel like that is sort of a shame.

So I wanted to ask you if any of you have any good advice regarding this sort of situation. And if you have tried anything similar, I would love to hear about your experience.

I have completed a 200 hour yoga alliance approved course in traditional Hatha Yoga.

Thanks in advance

Mikkel

#2

Interesting that yoga is squeezed so apologetically for a crowd that is primarily into taekwondo. You feel privileged to get this opportunity ‘to expand their horizon a bit’.

This whole idea appears to be coming from the organizers who are either themselves ignorant of the potential of yoga or pretend to look the other way due to ‘commercial’ constraints.

In my view, your options can be thus (in order of importance)

  1. Quit.
  2. Convince your own self that yoga is primarily spiritual but so much positive and inclusive that physical and emotional wellbeing is an integral part of it. You need to be considering your students as privileged to be hearing about such yoga. Your knowledge of true yoga needs to be so profound and the desire to share it with the students so passionate that it won’t matter if some ill-informed young ones are inattentive. Good luck.
#3

Dont just look at it so negative suhas.

Mikkelbue you are at your place to be . You have just finnished yoga TTC what place could be better for you to be? practicing to become a better teacher as i assume thats what you want to be. These taekwondo people would probably not notice if you did some beginners wrong nor would they put you to the wall if you forgot some sequence.

A perfect place if you want to become a better teacher, and your challenge is that the age is so mixed. The more you try to concentrate on thinking the sooner your answer will come to you from inside and then you might have the answer your self.

#4

Thank you for the responses :slight_smile:

I think you are both right in your own way. I live in a very small community in the arctics and it is actually quite rare to have to opportunity to share my knowledge, so I feel blessed for this opportunity to teach yoga to these Taekwondo students. I think they benefit greatly from the practice, not only because of the general spiritual effect that yoga can have on anyone. But I feel that they can actually use it in their practice of martial arts, if it is utilized in the right way. And I think that if the yoga is channeled in the right way, the Taekwondo students will have already cultivated a great level of body awareness that will strengthen their yogic practice. I do not think of martial arts and yoga as that different. I think that the disciplinary practice of taekwondo can also have a definite spiritual impact on the practitioners. While it might not be as gentle an art as yoga, it cultivates the warrior mind, which I feel is an integral part of yoga. And I think that the philosophy behind is mostly pacifistic, as it is encouraged only to use it as self-defense in life or peace threatening situations.

I am quite new to teaching and there is still much to be learnt. It was only my second time teaching this group last time, and I guess it is pretty normal to run into these kinds of crisis when you try to communicate something as profound as yoga.

I have thought much about your answers the last couple of days. Quitting is not an option, as I see this as a personal challenge and a possibility to reach people, that would not normally engage in yogic practice.
I feel like I have to focus more on the spiritual aspect of yoga and less on the physical benefits on balance, strength, flexibility and so on. Next time I have class, I am going to make a small jnana lecture, and try to cultivate a more introspectice concentration to my students, to make them more aware of the underlying meaning of the practice of yoga.

Thank you again.

#5

What an amazing opportunity!

Thanks for sharing your story, I do hope we get to here more of your work in the North.

Large classes are challenging in many ways, safety, you have to be ON, and you also have to surrender ego and accept that you can’t realistically engage that many individuals.

Of course separating the groups into age grouping works wonders in group dynamics and logistics, and can lead to some smooth runnings, but that may not always be possible.

I suggest you continue rocking the classes as best you can. Try to reach the ones who are engaged and not get distracted yourself by those who are distracted.

Here are some hopefuly innovative strategies you may have not considered consciously.

Some came for martial arts not Yoga. Deepak Chopra agrees with you that they are mutually compatible. So merge aspects of the Yogic breath. Show the vid or tell the story of Ultimate Fighter Rickson Gracie’s appearance in The Hulk.
Sequa that into a study of breath control to harness and quite the inner beast mode.

They are in the North. Celebrate the Northern cultural legacy and merge in some Yoga movements that mirror Northern legacy and say events in Northern games. Explore mirrored myths of the asanas, crow’s message, crow’s pose. Deepen with some cultural values and yogic values, and ‘stretch’ into some key poses for the developing athlete and perhaps a friendly competition.

Build on success. Celebrate the success of Northern efforts in artistic expression, the Artcirq, Arctic circus is building on beautiful expression of asana style poses against amazing Northern backdrops for world renown success that might rival performances and skyrocket performers to Cirque du Soleil status.

Best of luck and Namaste

#6

Get an assistant ,to walk around ,give adjustment they will like that ,
I spent many years as a(jka) karate student yoga will help them imho
Cheers

#7

@fakeyogi
I don’t think Suhas was negative in his response. He comes to yoga not through asana as many do. And honestly, for a new teacher to be teaching in this kind of setting (varying ages and large #'s) is not healthy or safe if practicing a traditional style class.

@mikkelbue,
Congrats to you and welcome!
Teaching to a large class, even for an experienced teacher is quite difficult. Add to that mix the age variance and the fact that you are a new teacher and that makes it all the more difficult. One teacher cannot “keep an eye on” 40 students. As yogamark suggested, I would check with management and see if you can split it up into age appropriate groups and much smaller ones as well. Much more manageable for you and safe for them. I’ve been teaching almost 7 years now and can’t imagine teaching a class that large!

What can also guide your teaching is knowing what the purpose is of these Tae Kwon Do students taking yoga. For strength? Flexibility? Something else? Most certainly is is purely asana based and not the spiritual side of yoga. That’s not to say that’s bad, because as we know yoga can and does address both. But knowing why they are taking yoga will allow you to tailor the class to their specific needs. Meditation/centering, pranayama and specific asana to address their needs (like balance) will likely serve them well. Of course this is my best “guess” based on what you’ve written. Any type of “flow” will be much too difficult.

Quite an endeavor you have taken on! I wish you much luck and hope you’ll let us know how things work out!

#8

Thank you again for the answers :slight_smile:
Yogamark: You are exactly right that I cannot focus on all of them and expect everybody to be completely engaged. I have probably set unrealistically high standards for myself to think that I could everybody into the “real thing”. Maintaining a positive atmosphere, while focusing on the people that are willing to go deeper, could be a better goal for the classes. I am a bit of a perfectionist and I am a bit sad that some of the students are not focused and not getting the full experience out of it. So I will try and focus on the students that are engaged.
And wonderful suggestions with integrating the practice with the northern culture. Eagle and Mountain Pose are directly applicable, but why not rename the Lion: “Polar Bear”? :slight_smile: That would much better capture the spirit of the place.

I have tried out a few different things since last. Some have been more succesful than others. I have tried to convince the Taekwondo-trainer to assist me, but I don’t think he is really that motivated. So for now it is just me :slight_smile: But splitting into groups and letting the student assist each other in difficult poses really works. Especially Head Stand and Tree (which I should really rename “Bush”, as there are no tree taller than one meter here) works great in pair work.
Simple Paranyama, Yoga Nidra and Asanas definitely work best. It is very difficult to instruct a full flow sequence like the Sun Salutation. There is too much disturbances and I don’t have time to make all the necessary corrections. So we usually warm up with something simpler, like shifting between two Asanas.

The Taekwondo club is on summer holidays for now, but I hope there will be more possibilities to explore these things in August, when we start again.

Thanks again for all the helpful suggestions :slight_smile: