(I received this product as a gift or at a discount in exchange for my honest and unbiased review.)
I love doing yoga with kids. They’re natural yogis and they enjoy the movement, the challenge, and the fun pose names. Yoga with kids doesn’t necessarily look like yoga with adults, but the little ones are still benefiting from the exercise, the breathing, the little lessons I like to sneak in, and the introduction to something that will hopefully end up being an anchor in their lives for years to come.
With that in mind, I jumped at the chance to review these Yoga Cards by Think Fun. I’m visiting my nephews for an extended period of time, and we’ve been doing some yoga on and off when they request it, which is usually just every few days or when they see me doing it. We do three or four poses together before they move on to trucks and crayons.
My nephews are three and five, which is younger than the Yoga Cards’ recommended age of six and up. The set (the size of normal playing cards) has 48 yoga pose cards with a clear cartoon picture as well as the pose name in both English and Sanskrit, six “mission” cards, a help card, and the instructions.
Some of the poses are a bit advanced, like half moon, warrior III, shoulder stand, and frog, but the kids see them all equally. Cat pose got an, “Oh, man, I don’t know about this one,” the same way bow did. They’re not intimidated, not afraid to try. Their attitude is also a really nice reminder that each pose has a purpose, and you never outgrow the “easy” poses, no matter how “advanced” you get.
The official mode of play involves 2-4 players. Each player gets a mission card and seven pose cards. The rest of the cards go face down in a draw pile, with the top one going face up beside it to create the discard pile.
The idea is to complete the missions (i.e. “Collect two cards where the yogi is touching at least one leg with his or her head.”) by collecting the necessary cards (already in hand or by drawing from the pile) and physically demonstrating each pose you play for 10 seconds.
Which sounds fun! But like I said, my nephews are three and five. We didn’t play by those rules.
Instead, I chose a card, showed it to them, and they did the pose. They insisted that I didn’t demonstrate it myself–they wanted to figure it out by looking at the picture. The three-year-old gave it up after a few cards, but the five-year-old went all the way through the deck.
I let him find the pose, then I would offer him little corrections, like “Good, now just straighten that leg!” or “Can you bring your hand all the way to the floor?”
The best part? He has asked to do this every night for the last week. He and I both are noticing the improvement in his poses already, and he’s very proud and happy about it. The cards are keeping his attention longer than I’ve been able to do on my own. Throughout our yoga time, I encourage deep breathing and I ask him to notice, for example, what happens to his breathing when he sits up straight. (“It’s easier to breathe.” Yep.)
I remind him that he can use his yoga to calm down and relax. I haven’t yet seen him put it to work in exchange for a meltdown over not being able to find his shoes, but we’re getting there.
Next step will be getting him to combine poses, but he says he’s not ready to do that yet.
I’ll be interested to see how they like the official rules of the game as they get older, but for now this yoga teacher and Auntie is over-the-moon happy about how they’ve responded to the Yoga Cards, especially the five-year-old.