Advanced Children's Yoga Teacher Training

Advanced Children’s Yoga Teacher Training

Mentoring & Practicum (Certification Course)

This 4-month online mentoring, practicum, and advanced training program helps trainees hone their craft and launch their business or career. Trainees will have the opportunity to receive feedback on their teaching and lesson plans through group discussion and peer support as well as by our experienced trainers. Study topics include

Yoga philosophy for children,
Yoga Instruction for children with neurodiversity, developmental challenges, and disability,
practicum and practice teaching, and
the business of kids yoga.

Training Overview

In this hybrid self-paced and live over zoom advanced training, Breathing Space helps trainees who have already started teaching children hone techniques for teaching child-friendly yoga philosophy, lesson planning, addressing classroom challenges, meeting the needs of children who learn differently or face developmental challenges or disabilities, and establish themselves professionally.

The training consists of bi-monthly meetings over zoom, an in-person or virtual retreat, self-paced learning modules, and office hours.

Many of our bi-monthly meetings will focus on discussing assigned readings covering handouts or online modules provided and the following required books:

Embrace Yoga’s Roots: Courageous Ways to Deepen Your Yoga Practice

The Whole-Brain Child: 12 Revolutionary Strategies to Nurture Your Child’s Developing Mind

Trauma-Informed Yoga: A Toolbox for Therapists

This is the final piece of the Breathing Space training, our certification course. Trainees who complete all age-group modules and the advanced training course are eligible for certification (exam and video classes required) and may be eligible to register for the Yoga Alliance 95 hr Registered Children’s Yoga Teacher (RCYT) credential (Yoga Alliance approval pending).

Learning Objectives

You will learn how to:

recognize and enhance your teaching strengths and address weaknesses in a supportive environment of your peers;
troubleshoot classroom behavior to identify student-empowering solutions to challenges that are consistent with Yoga ethics;
personalize your classes around the unique personalities and needs of your students;
understand and articulate the benefits of yoga techniques for children with neurodiversity, developmental difference, and disability;
offer adaptations for more accessible classes;
incorporate yoga philosophy themes in your lessons;
ground your teaching in respect for Yoga tradition while adapting to the needs of your students and learning environments;
understand how Yoga and the cultures in which we operate have been influenced by colonialism, racism, and inequity and explore how we can disrupt those cycles;
identify ethical and effective business practices and resources for establishing your career or profession.

Who Should Take This Training?

This certification course, practicum, and mentoring program is designed for Breathing Space trainees who are actively teaching children and wish to advance their skills.

Trainees must have completed or be enrolled in at least one of the age group training workshops – baby, early childhood or school age – prior to enrolling in the advanced training. All online modules on child development and at least one age group training must be completed before beginning the practice teaching component of the advanced training (2nd month). Please reach out if you have scheduling concerns.

Certification

While teaching kids yoga is tons of fun, we take the responsibility of being the teacher quite seriously. As a children’s yoga teacher, you are influencing the development – physically, emotionally, and ethically – of the next generation. You are also an ambassador for Yoga in any community in which you work.

Our training program exceeds Yoga Alliance standards for the Registered Children’s Yoga Teacher credential. The combination of our age-group modules and certification course are 108 hours of live or self-paced content. If trainees take advantage of office hours and peer-support opportunities during the certification, they will have engaged in over 120 hours of learning time, not including self study time and completing recommended readings.

The Breathing Space certification process requires trainees to demonstrate substantial understanding of yoga postures, philosophy, and instruction principles. There is a written exam and trainees must submit 3 class videos for review. Participants who have not completed an adult yoga teacher training will need to complete and submit a yoga self-study exam ($25 fee) along with their certification packet.

Cost:

Registration for this 4 month program costs $1200 and includes:

20+ hrs of live, interactive training with Jen Mueller, Breathing Space founder, and Jessica Lagarde, lead instructor and program administrator;
Opportunity to engage in personalized small group discussion with trainers during scheduled office hours;
Individualized feedback on practice teaching and video recording submissions during the certification process;
12+ hrs of self-paced training modules on advanced teaching and business topics;
A printable manual on advanced topics and loads of resource recommendations;
Lifetime access to the online resources;
Optional certification.

Upcoming Trainings

All 2022 trainings are offered in a hybrid format, incorporating self-paced online material and live (in-person or zoom) workshops focused on experiential learning and practice teaching. Trainees who complete all for modules and complete certification process may be eligible to register as a Yoga Alliance Register Children’s Yoga Teacher (RCYT).

Our advanced training is scheduled over 10 weeks, meeting for 2 hours every other week over Zoom and once in person for a 4 hour weekend workshop. Students are expected to complete reading and reflection assignments and teach children’s classes between training meetings. Optional trainer office hours provide an opportunity for additional guidance between meetings.

Fall 2023 – Dates TBD
tentatively
next cohort: Spring 2024

Continuing Education & Certification

Training participants will have the opportunity to become certified Breathing Space children’s yoga instructors. All hours are eligible for Yoga Alliance continuing education. We are in the process of getting approval as a YA Children’s Yoga Teacher Training School to offer a YA 95 hr RCYT. Breathing Space trainees may also apply the training toward the RCYT credential through the Children’s Yoga Teacher Training Collaborative.

New info coming soon: Looking for somewhere to stay near our DC training venues? Check out our housing recommendations.

About your Trainers

Jen Mueller Headshot Jen Mueller (MPM, YA E-RYT 200, YA CRYT, CIEM, IBCLC) has been teaching yoga to families and children since 2008. She has trained with Budding Yogis, ChildLight Yoga, Itsy Bitsy Yoga, Cosmic Kids Yoga, Yoga 4 Classrooms, and YoKid to offer classes to families and children of all ages. Jen’s work with children inspired her to complete adult yoga teacher training at Willow Street Yoga in 2010 and train in Prenatal Yoga with Janice Clarfield (Urgan Yoga) and Jennifer More (Dolphin Method).

Before turning her attention to yoga full time by founding Breathing Space, Jen spent more than a decade working with non profit organizations in everything from daily operations, event and volunteer management, and finance to national policy advocacy and media relations. Jen holds a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Massachusetts and a Master in Public Management degree from the University of Maryland.

Jen is a Yoga Alliance® Experienced Registered Yoga Teacher (E-RTY 200) and Registered Children’s Yoga Teacher (RCTY). She was a children’s yoga teacher trainer with Childlight Yoga / Childight Education Company for 8 years and co-created their Yoga for Babies & Toddlers training. She is also a Certified Educator of Infant Massage (CEIM) through Infant Massage USA and an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC).

Jen understands that good teachers are life-long students and has long worked to build professionalism within the children’s yoga field. Jen is the former executive director and emeritus board member of the National Kids Yoga Conference.

Jessica Lagarde (RYT 200, RMP) has been teaching creative movement in the metro area since 2005 and is passionate about helping children discover and explore their bodies and the world around them. She was trained by Joye Newman, MA to teach preschool creative movement for Kids’ Moving Company, a Bethesda-based creative movement studio. Her 200 hr adult yoga certification is through Ignite: Yoga and Wellness Institute. In 2017, she completed her Baby, Toddler, and Children’s Yoga Teacher Training through Childlight Yoga and has worked with Breathing Space Family Yoga ever since. Jessica teaches classes for infants-tweens, directs BSFY yoga camps, and does much of the behind the scenes business administration.

In addition to working with children, Jessica is a registered massage practitioner, with advanced training in CranioSacral Therapy and infant massage instruction and certification in prenatal massage. She has practiced massage since 2006 and taught massage as part of Potomac Massage Training Institute’s professional training program. She maintains a private massage practice through Shine Massage & Wellness in College Park, MD.

Outside of the movement space and massage room, she enjoys cooking, knitting, gardening, coffee, reading non-fiction, and exploring the outdoors with her daughter.

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Advanced Children’s Yoga Teacher Training