COURSE CONTENT

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Our aim is to support you in this important step on your path to becoming a yoga teacher. Most importantly, we want to help you to explore and expand your own understanding and practice of yoga, so that if you go on to teach, you do so from this vital foundation.

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Our curriculum fulfils all requirements for accreditation with Yoga Alliance® and much more.

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We will explore the following:

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Techniques, Teaching Methodology and Practice

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• Asana, meditation and pranayama techniques including their application, benefits, challenges, and modifications

• Basic Sanskrit and asana nomenclature

• Student-centred teaching - let go of a one-size-fits-all approach, and learn to engage with the humans on the mat right in front of you

• Verbal cues, demonstration and consent-based hands-on assists to effectively guide and teach your students in asana and pranayama

• Intuitive, present-moment teaching, integrating acquired knowledge with your innate wisdom

• Embodiment and sensuality

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You will start practicing your teaching from the first day of training, and continue frequently throughout the course, building the skills, confidence and ability to compassionately and constructively critique yourself and others in the art of teaching. 

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Anatomy & Physiology

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• Key anatomy and principles of healthy, functional movement for a lifetime of yoga practice

• Teaching different bodies (ie. ALL bodies) in a dynamic, compassionate and respectful way

• Anatomical and physiological features of a woman's body, how these may differ from a man's body, and the implications of this for yoga practice. Understanding the phases of the menstrual cycle and different life stages, and how these affect a woman's hormones, energy and physiology, and how yoga can support hormonal health and overall wellbeing

• Yoga for women during pregnancy, in early motherhood, and approaching and through menopause

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Yoga 'Herstory', Philosophy and Lifestyle and Ethics

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• The presence and absence of women in the story and philosophy of yoga across millenia

• Feminism and Yoga - the theory, practice and politics

• Meet the goddesses of yoga, and explore how you embody their qualities in your practice, teaching and life

• The Yoga Sutra of Patanjali, including the eight limbs

• Teaching from yoga philosophy, and how to weave a philosophical theme into an asana class in an authentic and meaningful way

• Foundations of the holistic health system of Ayurveda

• Unconscious (and sometimes conscious) discrimination within the yoga community. Racism, sexism, ableism and other prejudices as they present in the yoga community, and the role of the yoga teacher is in challenging / dismantling these.

• Cultural appropriation and the colonisation of yoga. 

• Yoga, social media, comparison and self acceptance

• Consent and boundaries

• Power and the nature of the teacher – student relationship 

 

 

Sequencing, Ritual and Holding Space

 

• The art and science of sequencing a class with attention to asana, energetics and theming

• Holding safe, non-judgmental, warm space for your students

 

You will learn a one-hour yoga sequence suitable for a vinyasa / flow class, along with more gentle / slow variations, giving you the knowledge and confidence to teach in most yoga studios upon graduation.

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The 'Business' of Yoga

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• Different pathways for graduate teachers including offering private classes, working for one or more studios, or establishing your own studio or business. Learn from those a little further ahead on the path

• How to optimise your chance of a studio contracting or employing you

• Nurturing yourself and your practice as you begin to teach

• How to market yourself and your offering in an authentic, ethical way

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Centring Women

 

We will explore the ways women have been included and excluded throughout yoga history, and how a practice that was apparently focused on boys and men, has evolved in the West to become a female-dominated activity. In the context of the prominence of women amongst yoga teachers and practitioners, we will examine sequences, asana, teaching styles, anatomical references and omissions, and the ways in which these persistently centre the experience, strengths, anatomy and comfort of men, and the consequences of this for women's health, self-esteem and experience of gender. We will consider how women-centred teaching and practice may differ from the common offerings today, and how this may include and/or alienate some students.

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We will explore the opportunities and challenges of centring women’s experience in our teaching whilst also accommodating male students, rather than the other way around. We will also look at the risk of falling into an essentialist approach, as though all women’s experience is the same, and how this can be avoided.

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