Goals & Objectives
Y4C™ Goals
The goal of Y4C™ is to create peaceful, productive, learning-ready classrooms in which students will learn to use yoga and mindfulness to improve their focus while developing a lifelong awareness of the importance of their physical and emotional health. Y4C™ will provide the school with a cost-effective, sustainable solution to improve student readiness to learn, while positively transforming the school culture.
Y4C™ Objectives
Yoga 4 Classrooms objectives include:
Teachers:
- To learn and utilize simple tools that support classroom, school and district educational and wellness objectives.
- To create a calm, harmonious classroom.
- To offer students healthy ways to express and balance their emotions.
- To promote a more relaxed, comfortable state of being - the perfect state for teaching and learning.
- To bring students into the present moment, the most basic requirement for learning.
- To encourage community and connectedness among and within the students themselves.
- To create an atmosphere of confidence, enthusiasm and non-competitiveness, where everyone can succeed.
- To empower students to support their own health and well-being, in and out of the classroom.
- To be inspired to focus on his/her own health and wellness through the process of education and modeling of the Y4C activities with their students.
- To use their own creativity to adapt the program as needed, and to utilize the many resources provided for further knowledge and expansion.
- To have the ability to monitor the impact of the program, as desired.
Students:
- To have opportunities for beneficial motor breaks throughout the day.
- To ease anxiety and tension (such as pre-test or performance jitters).
- To enhance focus, concentration, comprehension and memory.
- To have opportunities for reflection, patience and insight, reducing impulsivity and reactivity.
- To engage in character building activities that support social and emotional intelligence.
- To improve listening skills.
- To wake up sluggish minds and creativity as needed.
- To enhance organizational and communication skills.
- To improve posture, writing muscles while preparing to sit comfortably.
- To enhance motor skills and balance.
- To improve mind/body awareness and connection.
- To improve confidence and self-esteem.
- To gain improved respect for oneself and others.
- To gain understanding of, and ability to integrate wellness concepts such as healthy eating, positive thinking and having gratitude, which ultimately support health of the whole child.
- To develop the ability to tie-in the concepts learned to daily life in and out of the classroom.
Schools:
- To support the physical and emotional health and wellness of students and teachers.
- To support a school culture that promotes respect for others, the self and the environment.
- To support anti-bullying education.
- To support co-curricular objectives, including literacy, math, social studies, science, health and physical education.
- To support social interaction, team-building and a sense of community within the student body and teaching staff.
- To create a school culture where everyone shares a common language of wellness, creating a sense of community and harmony within the school. For example, when we feel anxious, we practice Balloon Breathing to help calm and center ourselves.
- To provide long-term program sustainability. Once implemented, Yoga 4 Classrooms™ is self-sustained as teachers continue to use the program with future groups of students, while the concepts are reinforced as students move up through the grades of the school.
- To have the ability to monitor the impact of the program, as desired.
