Yoga Club

a 60hour Kids Yoga Course with Yoga on the Lane

  • Dates

    2025 dates are coming soon…

  • Times

    Saturdays 12-7pm

    Sunday 10.15-6pm

  • Price

    TBC

Our mission

Yoga Club aims to address the mental health and wellbeing crisis that faces children and young people in London schools in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. We will support children from the most disadvantaged families to build their resilience and fortitude by developing skills for self-regulation learnt by practicing yoga. We believe that breath-led dynamic yoga which combines body awareness with mindfulness teaches children to recognise how they are feeling and most importantly how to self-regulate is an essential tool for building physical and mental wellbeing. We will work with charities to identify the most under-privileged young people who would otherwise not access yoga.

Yoga on the Lane aims to develop a programme of dynamic yoga for children taught by professional teachers - Yoga Club. The programme has already been delivered in UK schools and we hope to expand on this so that all children can experience a safe place within which to explore their emotional health; develop resilience and find a sense of belonging within their own bodies.

  • The Challenge

    In 2017 one in nine children were living with a mental disorder; in 2020 this number had risen to one in six according to The Mental Health of Children and Young People in England. Data for other elements affecting children’s wellbeing show a similar decline in levels of wellbeing and resilience. 87% of children in a survey carried out by children’s mental health charity Young Minds reported feeling lonely or isolated and 40% reported that there was no school counsellor available to them during autumn 2020. Children from BAME communities are less likely than their white peers to access traditional mental health services and their mental health needs are regularly overlooked, only being addressed when they come into contact with the criminal justice system with young people finally receiving mental health support via the court system. 32% of children and young people do less than an average of 30 minutes of physical activity a day but 60% of girls don’t meet recommended exercise guidelines; 30% of children aged 2 - 15 are also estimated to be overweight but for children living in the most deprived areas obesity prevalence was more than double those living in the least deprived areas.

  • A Potential Solution

    This snapshot of children’s health and wellbeing gives a clear picture of the complex challenge in the years ahead. Yoga Club offers a remedy that is accessible to all young people and right now is the perfect time to pilot this project. Teaching children these crucial life skills supports them to:

    Learn how to self-regulate emotions and to cope with anxiety and stress

    Develop the skills to build tolerance and understand paving the way for a more tolerant and cohesive community

    Address potential health issues including mental wellbeing and appreciation for physical activity

    Develop mindfulness, focus and self-expression

    Compassion and Kindness to others and self

    Develop and articulate body agency and develop positive body image

    Learn practical skills of self-care

  • Aims and Objectives

    Excellent yoga programmes already exist in both formal and informal settings which we acknowledge and applaud. We are planning to offer something complementary yet unique in its flavour.

    Yoga Club is for those children who might otherwise not access yoga. Yoga is readily available to middle class children in a plethora of yoga studios across the country. It is also available in schools, often as an elective after-school club or an add-on in PE. Much of children’s yoga has a focus on story-telling and shape-making but we are creating a programme that is child-centred and which foregrounds body agency by empowering the participants to take decisions about their own movement practice.

    We focus on the element of yoga concerned with breath-awareness and self-regulation. Many children even at a young age have lost body awareness and our programme addresses this, so that children are able to recognise their mental and emotional states and through physical movement and breath awareness move towards a more healthy attitude to the challenges they face.

  • Who is Yoga Club For?

    Yoga Club is respectful and accessible without narrowing the scope of yoga as it is taught to adults. It honours yoga’s ancient roots and teaches all children in an accessible, inclusive and secular way. Our programme respects children’s concerns, thoughts and emotions and teaches them to meet themselves however they are feeling in a compassionate way and then to respond skillfully. We will equip children with language to describe and articulate how they / their bodies are feeling which is a skill that is absent from current education with its focus on academic attainment.

    We will target the children whose parents may not readily select yoga through a lack of awareness or understanding of what yoga is and of its benefits.

    We plan to work in partnership with organisations and charities like Magic Breakfast and Place 2 Be to offer Yoga Club alongside existing activities to strengthen the offer and to ensure the most vulnerable young people are being targeted.

Programme Details

Yoga on the Lane will train existing yoga teachers, or experienced yoga practitioners and school teachers and assistants, to adapt their teaching for young people. The focus will be on teaching children self-soothing; creative breath-work and body awareness techniques for resilience and emotional regulation.  The programme will also offer an INSET session for school teachers if they are hosting yoga club or ongoing yoga classes alongside the children’s classes.

The training will support young people to explore the following and offer them tools to carry with them: 

  • Ways to uplift and energise

  • Ways to calm anxiety

  • Ways to get ready for sleep

  • Ways to meet with feelings of anger and frustration

  • Ways to express joy, compassion and kindness

‘Our programme respects children’s concerns, thoughts and emotions and teaches them to meet however they are feeling in a compassionate way and then to respond skillfully.’

The Training will cover the following:

  • Yoga as a Tool for Body Agency & Self-Regulation

    How to modify sequences for children at different stages

    How to use language and cueing in an inclusive and accessible way

    Sequences and options

    Understanding how to teach in a trauma informed way

  • Yoga’s context - history and philosophy

    How to present yoga’s history & philosophy to children

    How to teach children from different backgrounds in an inclusive way

    Will cover myths and ethics

  • Anatomy

    Information on how to teach children about their bodies and look after them

    What to expect from children at different stages with regards to motor skills, coordination, body development

  • Safeguarding & Working with Schools

    Safeguarding training

    Advice on DBS

    Working with schools - a practical guide

    What’s covered on the curriculum

  • Child Development

    What to expect at every stage

    How to support children at every stage

Who is Involved?

  • Naomi Annand is a yoga teacher and founder and director of east London’s Yoga on the Lane. Since 2002 she has been teaching mindful, compassion-based Vinyasa with a restorative feel. Naomi is passionate about social justice and having taught for https://www.eavesforwomen.org.uk/about-eaves/our-projects/the-poppy-project/ early on in her career learnt a lot. She currently teaches the women https://you-make-it.org and yoga for the kids at Daubeney School: https://www.daubeney.hackney.sch.uk

    Naomi believes yoga to be a transformational practice on and off the mat, an ethos that underpins the Yoga on the Lane teacher training program, which she runs in partnership with her brilliant team.

    Naomi is the author of Yoga: a Manual for Life and Yoga for Motherhood, published by Bloomsbury.

  • Rakhee Jasani is a yoga teacher, writer, creative leader and innovator and is an alumnus of the Yoga on the Lane teacher training programme. Prior to teaching yoga, Rakhee co-founded the youth arts and education charity Eastside Educational Trust, which provides creative opportunities to disadvantaged children and young people across London. She served as the charity’s Director for twenty-three years (1994-2017), working in partnership with organisations as varied as Arts Council England, Adobe, the British Film Institute and Disney. She has an MA in English and Modern Languages from Oxford University and a Diploma in Arts Management from Birkbeck College. Her main focus is now on writing and teaching yoga. Her classes combine dynamic breath-led yoga, qigong and meditation with restorative calm; in sequences that help her students to discover their own creative expression and awaken their spirit. She regularly teaches children and young people

  • Chantell has been practising yoga for 10 years - researching and personally experiencing the benefits, she was drawn to develop a deeper understanding and to teach. She is a compassionate and mindful yoga and meditation teacher, clinical psychologist, and human. She’s completed trainings across the UK, India and Europe. She teaches from the heart, working with all ages - from children, teens and adults. Sharing her love for the practice and belief in it’s healing and transformational power, she gently interweaves yoga philosophy and psychology throughout her breath-led flows. Her sequences aim to energise, relax and restore with mindful movement, meditation and breath-work. Encouraging us to slow down and be with our experiences, as they are, whatever they are. Guided by her gentle voice and heart-centred approach, she aims to create nurturing and inclusive spaces for self-exploration, strengthening, and self-care - on and off the mat.

  • Avni Trivedi is an experienced and intuitive practitioner using touch and movement to help people to connect with their bodily wisdom. She is a Women’s Health and Paediatric Osteopath, Birth Doula, Zero Balancer and Non-Linear Movement Teacher. Her podcast, Speak From the Body’ explores themes such as embodiment, stress, trauma, hormones and

    pleasure. She has two online courses, ‘The Intuitive Way to Wellness’ and ‘The Embodied Pregnancy Programme’. Avni runs regular workshops called ‘Moving Through Loss’ to gently address grief in the body.

  • Julia Caird (or Jules) is a London based Yoga Teacher, Accredited Yoga Therapist, and Highly Specialist Speech and Language Therapist. Jules has been practising yoga and meditation since 2010, and qualified as a Yoga Teacher (300 hour accreditation) in 2015 with Senior Teachers Norman Blair and Melanie Cooper. She completed her Yoga Therapy Diploma with The Life Centre Yoga Campus in 2020, over some 550 hours plus intensive training. As a Yoga Teacher, she currently teaches open-level public classes in London studios: Vinyasa Flow and Yin Yoga. She works with businesses teaching yoga in the workplace, providing weekly yoga for all the staff, and one off sessions for companies. She also teaches yoga to school teachers and to children with special needs. She has trained with Special Yoga and sees children in schools for small groups and for 1:1s. She is passionate about ensuring everyone can access yoga, and enjoys teaching 1:1s to support individual growth and development.