Valentine’s Day is celebrated annually on February 14. It’s a day to celebrate love and friendship. It is a special opportunity to express your love and affection. You can express your love to your parents, your cousins, and friends, even to your pet. It is a day when you should share your love with your loved ones.
The symbol of Valentine’s Day is a “heart”. Then, let’s talk about heart! Your heart is really a muscle. It’s located a little to the left of the middle of your chest, and it’s about the size of your fist. But the heart muscle is special because of what it does. The heart sends blood around your body.
Most kids are born with a healthy heart and it’s important to keep yours in good shape. Remember that your heart is a muscle. If you want it to be strong, you need to exercise it.
Here are some yoga poses that you can do to help keep your heart happy!
Before we begin heart opening yoga poses, let’s warm up with a flow:
Warm Up Yoga for Kids:
“Daddy Dog takes the Puppy Dog to the park while Baby Dog stays home with Mommy Dog.” (Start flowing with the words…)
- Daddy Dog (Dog)
- Puppy Dog
- Baby Dog (Child’s Pose)
- Mommy Dog (Upward Facing Dog)
I recommend repeating the flow at least three times to warm up.
Valentine’s Day Yoga Poses for Children:
These poses are generally to put your attention on the area around your heart and chest:
Angel: Standing with feet together take the hands round the back and see if you can press the palms together in a reverse prayer. Your arms from the front give you the appearance of having two little angel wings.
Dancer: Standing tall, take hold of one leg. Lifting your other arm up to the sky, kick your back foot into your hand and tilt forwards. Remember to smile in this pose.
Chair prayer: Standing with feet together or a bit apart, bend the knees and bring your hands together at your heart. Keep the chest open.
Star: Standing tall with your legs wide and arms outstretched. You are a big sparkly star.
Warrior 2: Standing with your feet wide, bend your front knee and spread your arms out wide.
Reverse Warrior: Step one foot forward and turn the back toes out to the side. Bend into the front knee and take the arms wide. Take the hand down onto the back leg and lift the other arm up into the sky, leaning the body back. Look up to the top hand
Triangle: Step one foot forward and turn the back toes out to the side. Stretch the arms wide and look over the front outstretched arm. Move the body forwards as if someone is pulling the front hand. When you can’t go further forward, tilt down, taking the hand of the front arm to the inside of the ankle. Stretch and open the chest and look up to the top hand.
Rainbow: Come to two knees and take your arms wide. Place one hand down to the side and extend your leg out to the other side. Reach up and over your ear with your top arm, making a beautiful arching rainbow.
Camel: Kneeling, we put our hands round to our lower back and press our bottom forwards, lifting our hearts to the sky.
Snake: Coming onto our tummy, we place our hands underneath our shoulders. We wiggle up into a snake.
Bowl: Lying on our tummies, flick our feet up towards our bottoms. We reach around with our arms and take hold of our ankles. Kicking our legs into our hands, we lift our chests up. Now pretend to breathe in and out of your heart.
Whale: Lie on your back and bend your knees so your feet are flat. Arms lay down by your sides. Press into your feet, arms and hands and lift your bottom up. Feel the expansion in the chest.
Fish: Lying on your back, prop yourself up on your elbows and point your toes down. Then pop your chest up to the sky and look all the way back behind you. Be gentle when the head is going back.
Slide: Sitting up tall, legs out long in front of you. Point your toes and place your hands behind your bottom with your finger pointing towards your bottom. Lift up your hips.
Supine Twists: We lie on our backs and take our arms wide. We bend our knees and lift them up. We take our legs over to one side and let them rest on the floor. We turn our head to look in the opposite direction to our legs.
As a kids’ yoga teacher, you may use a language to raise awareness of the qualities of heart while doing the yoga poses such as:
- “Open your beautiful heart.”
- “Shine your heart energy.”
- “Keep your heart as open as the sky.”
- “An open heart sees the beauty of the World.”
- “Be thankful for all you have.”
- “Live your life with an open heart.”
- “Get still and listen to your heart.”
- “Feel your unique energy shining from your heart center.”
- “Magic happens when you open your heart.”
- “Open your heart to receive the energy of love.”
Before relaxation, you may prefer to finish your valentine’s day yoga flow with some partner yoga poses. Partner yoga poses for kids do not only strengthen communication but also deepen connection. Here are some partner yoga poses I recommend to put kids’ attentions again on the area around their hearts:
- Double Dancer Pose
- Lean on Me Pose
- Warrior Friends Pose
- Open Heart Pose
- Lizard Sunbathing on the Rock Pose
- Supported Backbend Pose
- Double Camel Poses (Variation 1 and 2)
- Backbend Balance Pose
At the end they will have lots of fun, understanding that we can accomplish much more, with much more joy and ease when we support each other.
Relaxation:
Butterfly Fingertip Massage: It is a relaxation technique that you can apply at the end of the yoga poses. The children sit in a circle by turning their backs to one another. They massage to each other’s neck, shoulder, arms, back with their fingertips.
Valentine’s Day Yoga Game for Kids:
Musical Hearts:
Materials Needed: Music, Pre-cut and Heart Shaped Colored Cardboard Papers (The size of the papers must be large enough to fit children’s feet.)
My favorite songs to play are:
Let’s Get Together both by Bari Koral
Game Proceedings:
- Just like musical chairs, “musical heart” is a game of elimination involving players, heart shaped cardboards, and music, with one fewer cardboard than players.
- Players are gathered in a circle around the cardboards.
- Play the music and have the kids dance around the hearts.
- When the music stops whichever player fails to stand on a cardboard is eliminated, with a cardboard then being removed.
- The player who is eliminated performs a heart-opening yoga pose learned in class.
- The process is repeated until only one player remains.
Valentine’s Day Yoga Activity for Kids:
It is a page from the book Sitting Still Like a Frog by Eline Snel. Ask the children “If your heart was a room, who would be in it? Think of someone or something that makes you feel happy like a parent, friend or sibling. Feel that happy feeling in your heart.”