The Kids' Yoga Deck: 50 Poses and Games [Misc. Supplies]

Annie Buckley (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 23, 2006

Yoga is fun! Get kids bending, breathing, and stretching with The Kids Yoga Deck. Playful poses such as Cat, Flower, Airplane, and Gorillaas well as partner poses that can be performed with friendsteach kids the basics of yoga. Easy enough for children to do on their own, The Kids Yoga Deck engages bodies and minds to help youngsters build strength, flexibility, balance, and mental focus.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Annie Buckley MFA, is an artist and teacher. She lives in Southern California.

Product Details

• Misc. Supplies: 50 pages
• Publisher: Chronicle Books (June 23, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0811836983
• ISBN-13: 978-0811836982
• Product Dimensions: 5.8 x 4.1 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #317,849 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

93 of 93 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful gift for creative play!, July 4, 2004

By 

Vanessa Bradley (Dallastown, PA United States) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Kids' Yoga Deck: 50 Poses and Games (Misc. Supplies)

I teach yoga to people of all ages, including my son's preschool class of three year-olds. I think this set is truly wonderful. :-)

I guess I'm writing in response to the oh, please review. That parent might wish to take a second look from a different perspective. I am an instructor and know the value of good instruction with a qualified teacher, but kids just naturally do yoga! Parents can use common sense to help kids practice safely at home. This deck stimulates creativity. Yoga for kids is FUN!!! So many things in life are serious enough. I am serious about my own practice, but light-hearted, too. I have Babar's Yoga for Elephants (LOVE IT!), but that is a little too "old" for my son, as yet. This deck he has been using since his third birthday. The illustrations are light-hearted and bright! The names reflect things found in nature and our world. The author named parsvottanasana "pyramid" and pascimottanasana as "river" in this deck. She uses imagery i.e., "Imagine that your legs are the sandy river bottom and your spine is the water flowing down." Pyramid works! Your legs need to be really strong and stable to hold this pose, like a pyramid. Maybe the cutesy name referred to was "upside-down gorilla." (The deck is recommended for ages 4 and up. I wouldn't use some of the names with my adult classes, unless the intention of the class were PLAY!, maybe! but this deck is intended for children. A lot of the names match the English translation of the Sanskrit.) The author knows that kids loooooove imaginative play! She gives suggestions for encouraging kids to use their imagination within the poses to get a real feeling for the poses as they practice.

The deck is color-coded with breathing poses, sitting and standing poses, upside-down and forward-bending poses, backward-bending poses, twisting poses, partner poses and resting poses. She gives suggestions for incorporating artwork, language arts, cooperation, non-competitiveness and listening to one's own body into the practice of yoga. Their are some "strings" of poses suggested as well as ideas for creating your own strings, using cards of different colors. Each card has on the front side an illustration of each pose, like the one shown on the front of the box. On the back she has written instructions to give for getting into and out of the pose, as well as suggestions for how to be in the pose - breathing, feeling sensation different places. Below she has suggestions for moving deeper, for expressing how the pose affected you with words, art, finding things that resemble the pose in nature, etc. This deck is truly a wonderful gift for those wishing to share the spirit and beauty of yoga with children. This touches kids beyond the physical of just how to get into the outer form of a pose.

There are some other neat books for kids out there like Fly Like a Butterfly, Playful Family Yoga, Thia Luby's book, The Idiot's Guide to Yoga with Kids, among others. This deck is very accessible (easy to just pick a card, more so than paging through a book, to be honest), safely and effectively sequenced, inspiring for children's (and adult) creativity and just a joy to use! I highly recommend it!!! I hope this review is useful!

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Backbone of a Great Kids Yoga Class, June 8, 2005

By 

Kitt Winters (Oklahoma, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Kids' Yoga Deck: 50 Poses and Games (Misc. Supplies)

These cards are very useful in structuring a class for children. The children enjoy seeing the brightly colored cards which show how it looks when doing the pose. You can make your own "string of poses" for the children to do, as the deck suggests, by picking a card from each color (rainbow string), or there are other "strings" suggested (basic string, sleepy string, energy string, friends string, calming down string, warm-up for sports string). I teach yoga to children ages 6-12 at a Youth Center, and I use these cards for every class. We mostly use the Rainbow String, except I often put the partner poses (a yellow card) at the end of a class to close it. That way, the children leave the class feeling a connection with one another. Often, I pick two poses in a particular color group (usually the light green and the red cards) to extend the class to a 30 minute time frame. There are really nice GAMES at the bottom of each card, listed after instructions for doing the pose. They are clearly bulleted, and I have found them to be very useful. The children are interested in these cards, and they like to shuffle them around and read them. They can offer input for class content. These cards spark their interest in yoga. I have many "yoga for children" books which I use as supplements occasionally, but this yoga deck forms the structure for the children's yoga classes. I would recommend it for home use also. These cards are easy to use, and they make yoga FUN for the kids!

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars From the heart of a teacher and a yogi, February 24, 2004

By 

jenmansfield (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Kids' Yoga Deck: 50 Poses and Games (Misc. Supplies)

I use the yoga deck in my 4th grade classroom with my 9 and 10 year old students. They LOVE it! It's a fabulous way to integrate a holistic and nurturing physical education program into my language arts curriculum. The cards are so easy to use that my students can use them independently and in small groups. A "must have" for all teachers!