Monday, March 09, 2009

RAINBOW KIDS YOGA!!




Life is a collection of awesome strings of experiences. I had this beautiful experience in the week of March 19-22, 2009 with a fun loving group of people at NYC. I came across Rainbow Kids Yoga when I was browsing for something interesting to do for the Siragu kids in India. You all know that the Siragu Montessori School is a free school with an alternative system of education for homeless street children in Chennai, SouthEast India.

When I came across their website, it took me only a few minutes to decide to take the teacher training course. The peace I felt when I met Gopala the first time was contagious. The other wonderful people who joined the training were all so energetic and loving. I could see their eagerness to learn and share their knowledge with the kids they'd go back to.
The playfulness of the group was inspiring and Gopala had brought out the child in all of us. We all left our adulthood outside and interacted with each other as kids. The atmosphere was filled with fun and learning alternating in a smooth flowing way.

We learned a lot of fun poses for kids and family and Gopala taught us to integrate yoga poses in the kids' stories and also gave us each 5 minutes to conduct a class of our own on the last day of training. Creativity flowed as each one of us got a hands on the teaching and the rest acted like kids trying to create a real atmosphere of teaching kids. It was fun trying to distract the teacher and trying to cope up with distracting kids and engaging them while the assignment was going on. It was so much fun! We laughed so much and enjoyed every single moment of the training. By the fourth day, even though we were exhausted, we went with the flow and did not feel it a lot.
I could go more and more about the whole experience but I think after all this learning, it is up to us to practice it and share it with the world outside. I intend to prepare a curriculum and teach the kids at Siragu School next time i go to India.
you can also see pictures here.