Support and improve reading with yoga
Can it really be possible to improve reading with yoga? Well, along with many other health benefits, yoga can also help children learn to read by increasing their concentration and refining their visual tracking skills.
Increase concentration through yoga
Research has shown that yoga in schools has been found to have “exerted positive effects on factors such as emotional balance, attentional control*, cognitive efficiency, anxiety, negative thought patterns, emotional and physical arousal, reactivity, and negative behavior.”
* emphasis added here
We know that by activating the proprioceptive sense, we can help children to reach and maintain the optimum level of alertness for learning (neither over excited nor drowsy). In this state of optimal alertness, children are better able to concentrate and focus on their learning, including reading.
This of course, is a significant benefit of teaching yoga in schools.
Yoga breathing exercises such as those listed below are another way for children (and adults!) to improve concentration.
Try these yoga poses & breathing activities to improve concentration:
- Mountain pose
- Tree pose
- Dog pose
- Seated forward bend (sandwich pose)
- Bee breathing (snuggle up together with a book, try a few bee breaths to relax and focus before you begin reading)
- Feather breath
- Belly breathing
Support and improve reading with yoga poses & activities to encourage visual tracking skills
What is visual tracking?
Why is visual tracking important for reading?
- reversing letters (b & d)
- difficulty spelling
- skipping words or lines when reading
- reading slowly
- not understanding what has been read
How can we help children to develop their visual tracking skills?
- Spider pose
- Dolphin pose
- Floating feather breath (watch and follow the floating feather after you have blown it away)
- Snake pose
Other fun ways to develop visual tracking skills include:
- Reading aloud (or reading along in your head, while listening to the audiobook of the text you have chosen).
‘Hearing your own [or another] voice in real time will force your eyes and brain to work together.’ – beatingdyslexia.com - Play eye-spy
- Play ball games
- Walk along a log, or a chalk line on the ground without stepping off it
- Fly a kite & watch it swoop & soar
- Do dot-to-dot pictures
- Complete jigsaw puzzles
Core strength to improve visual tracking
Many yoga poses and activities develop the ‘core’ (shoulder, spinal, hip and abdominal) muscles. It has been found that a strong, well developed core is key to overcoming learning challenges, including difficulty reading. This makes perfect sense, as having a strong, stable core gives your head and eyes a secure starting point for visual tracking. Once a child has developed a stable core, he or she will be able to devote their concentration fully to the task at hand (for example reading). This comes naturally to adults, but children must be given the opportunity to develop their core strength & balance through physical activity.
‘Strengthening the core muscles will help your body to balance and coordinate itself properly. By doing this, it helps your eye muscles to work in sync.
beatingdyslexia.com
‘When children have difficulties maintaining postural control it involves more energy. Therefore during higher cognitive load tasks such as reading, attention is shared, possibly decreasing learning capabilities.’
yourtherapysource.com
By now you will have gained a good understanding of how you can support and improve reading with yoga and other activities. You will be able to encourage your child to try some of these together with you and observe how they become more comfortable and confident when reading.
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