5 Essential Questions Yoga Teachers Can Ask Themselves Before Each Class

"When I started teaching yoga more than 30 years ago, I tended to share incredibly detailed explanations of each pose during class. I sometimes even ran past the scheduled end time and students had to remind me they had busy lives and needed to leave! Eventually, I came to understand that as they juggled those busy lives, students could only take in so much information at a time. And that as a teacher, one of the most essential things I could do to help students is pace my sharing of knowledge."

"When I overwhelmed them with too much information at once, I wasn't making the practice approachable for students, no matter my good intentions. What I found is that in order to create effective and accessible yoga classes, I needed to ask myself some essential (and sometimes surprising) questions. The answers informed not only the information I shared but my sequences and how I showed up as a teacher."

"One of the biggest challenges-and responsibilities-as teachers is figuring out what to share, how much to share, and in what order to share it. The following considerations can help you identify what will actually support the students in front of you as well as your evolution as a teacher. For each question, you'll find a couple additional and more prompts that might help you focus on the specific ways that question shows up in your teaching."

"Is the sequence appropriate for the students I'm teaching? Can I let go of my original plan to support who is in the space and what they need today? One of the signs of an experienced yoga teacher is the ability to think on the fly and shift the class plan according to how students are responding. That skill can take time to develop. It also demands a firm understanding of the basic foundations of yoga practice before you can feel confident enough to improvise."

Overly detailed pose explanations can cause classes to run long and overwhelm students who have limited attention during busy lives. Effective, accessible yoga instruction depends on pacing knowledge so the practice remains approachable. Teaching requires deciding what to share, how much to share, and in what order, while also evolving as a teacher. Planning starts with identifying who is being taught and whether the sequence fits their needs. Teachers may need to release original plans and adjust based on how students respond. Improvisation becomes possible only after building strong foundational understanding of yoga practice, similar to learning to improvise with a musical instrument.

Read at Yoga Journal