Children's yoga isn't a scaled-down adult class, and it goes wrong the moment anybody tries to run it as one. Done well it looks much more like structured animal play with a little breathing attached, and what it gives a three-year-old is far more concrete than the wellness language wrapped around it suggests.
I trained as a physiotherapist before I had any of my five, and this is the one area of the site where I'm writing from inside my own field. So let me be specific about what it builds, because the specifics are lovely.
What it builds
It builds balance and proprioception, which is the sense of where the body is in space, and that underlies nearly every other physical skill a child will learn, and it's very trainable at this age. It builds core strength, which is what supports sitting still at a table, holding a pencil, and eventually handwriting. It teaches crossing the midline, the coordination milestone of reaching an arm across the body, which supports reading and writing later on. It builds body awareness and, just as usefully, the vocabulary for it, so a child can tell you where a sensation is and not only that something feels wrong, and with Katherine, who came to words late, that vocabulary counted enormously. It teaches slow breathing on demand, which is a real self-regulation tool and has to be learned somewhere calm to be available somewhere difficult. It builds a small tolerance for stillness. A minute of quiet is a skill, and most children get very little practice at it.
The research base on children's yoga is modest and made up mostly of small studies. The physical benefits are unsurprising and well founded. The claims about attention and behavior are plausible and much less firmly established. This is a good activity and it isn't a treatment.
What works at each age
The distance between eighteen months and five years is enormous here, and what suits either end has almost nothing in common with the other.
With toddlers, from around eighteen months to three, you want two or three poses with animal names, no sequence at all, and no expectation that anything gets held. Five minutes is a long session and a successful one. Holly is two, and our sessions consist largely of her being a cat for about forty seconds and then leaving.
From three to five, story-led sequences work beautifully, a walk through the jungle where every animal you meet is a pose. Ten minutes is realistic. From five to eight you can introduce short held poses, simple sequences and the beginnings of real breathing exercises, and fifteen to twenty minutes is comfortable.
More at home
The poses that work
They're all named after animals children can already do, and that's the entire method.
Cat and cow, on hands and knees, arching and dipping the back, is the easiest place to start and the noises are half the appeal. Downward dog, introduced as a dog having a stretch, opens up shoulders and hamstrings. Tree, standing on one leg with the other foot resting at the ankle or calf, builds balance, and the wobbling is part of it.
Butterfly, sitting with the soles together and knees flapping, is a favorite with mine. Cobra, lying on the front and lifting the chest, is a lovely counterbalance to a day spent sitting. Child's pose becomes the resting position between everything else. Boat, balanced on the bottom with the legs lifted, does real core work while looking entirely like a game.
Breathing, taught as a game
None of these is called breathing when you teach it, and that counts for far more than the technique itself.
Bumblebee breath asks for a hum on the out-breath, where the vibration is the appeal and the long exhale is what counts. Birthday candles is breathing in and blowing out slowly, ten fingers for ten candles. Snake breath goes in through the nose and out with a hiss for as long as possible, which children adore. Belly breathing with a small toy resting on the tummy gives them something to watch rise and fall.
The principle underneath all of them is that a long exhale slows the heart rate. Teach them when everybody is calm and happy, because a child can't learn a technique in the middle of a meltdown, and she can absolutely use one she already knows.
What to skip
Some of this is about growing bodies, and some of it is about the fact that correcting a four-year-old's form is the fastest way to end the session.
Skip headstands, shoulder stands and any inversion resting on the head or neck, because growing spines and open growth plates make those a poor idea. Skip deep backbends and pushing any stretch to its limit, since children are frequently hypermobile and can reach positions their joints aren't yet stabilized for. Take that one seriously. It's the point where my professional training makes me firmer than most yoga guides you'll read. I could be wrong about the guides, having stopped reading them.
Skip long held poses, which aren't appropriate at this age regardless of attention span. Skip adjusting a child's body with your hands and demonstrate instead. Skip hot yoga entirely, at every age in childhood, and skip correcting form altogether. If it looks roughly like the pose and nothing hurts, then it's the pose.
Making it stick
Short and frequent beats long and occasional every time. Five minutes after school or before bed, three or four times a week, will do more for your child than a weekly class.
Join in with her, because children copy far more readily than they follow directions, and because doing it together is most of the pleasure. Let her lead sometimes too. A four-year-old inventing a pose and giving it a name is doing exactly the same physical work with much more enthusiasm, and in our house those are always the best sessions.
This guide is general information, written to help you understand a topic and ask better questions. It is not medical advice and does not replace your own doctor, midwife or paediatrician. Anything that worries you about your baby belongs with them.