Yoga teachers, are you talking about your walking?

As yoga teachers, our role goes beyond demonstrating poses and leading sequences. One of the most critical aspects of our teaching is the ability to effectively lead lessons. Reporting is the language of yoga teaching; it bridges the gap between the teacher’s knowledge and the student’s experience on the mat. By honing our communication skills, we can create a more supportive, engaging and transformative environment for our students. Proper cueing also ensures that students understand how to enter, maintain, and transition between poses safely and effectively.

The first and last thing to understand is the importance of precision in the alignment marks. THE the more precise your cues are, the safer your students’ practice becomes. Accuracy is a fundamental aspect of our teaching that we must always keep in mind. You could believe You are specific. However, terms like “move the arm”, “extend the spine” and “stand wide” are not quite precise. Consider these examples below:

No specific clues 👎

• “Lengthen the spine» – Which part do we extend? How to make the extension? From where to where? Lengthen the spine by lifting the sternum and flaring the ribs? No, no, no, this will deactivate the diaphragm, disassemble the core and compress T12-L1! Lie on the side of the body to extend the spine by squeezing the lateral waist and ribs toward the spine. Now we are on the right track…
• “Stand wide» – What width? Hip width? A foot away? Feet parallel or turned? Guide me, please.
• “Move your arm» – Left or right arm? What part of the arm? In which direction? How do I move my arm?

Are you with me?! There is no such thing as “too much precision.” The more precise you are, the smoother your lessons will be. This will in turn increase the feeling of flow, of being in the zone, or what we traditionally call Samadhi, that wonderful connected space where the mind is completely absorbed in the action.

So anyone who has taken a few yoga classes will know the basic lingo:

• Microfold your knees
• Neutral back
• Square your heels
• Tuck your tailbone – (I prefer to use “lengthen tailbone” myself)
• Lengthen the side body
• Commit your A’s, B’s and C’s
• Relax

But after a while, you can start to feel like a broken record, and it’s good to expand your cueing vocabulary. Take a look below and if you are a new teacher, I encourage you to create a cue journal, using these and any other cues from your favorite teachers.

ACTION CLUES – these cues are great for helping students move around the mat. Some are small movements; others are bigger transitions. They all indicate a movement from A to B.

Knowing how to stack a pose isn’t enough; it’s really important to be able to spot transitions. You may be thinking, “OK, I want to teach pigeon pose after Warrior Two,” but how do your students transition from one to the other? If you don’t provide specific cues focused on breathing, students are less likely to maintain the pace and flow of class and are even more likely to injure themselves. You have to think about a fluid transition, accessible to all and be able to articulate it to maintain the pace of the course. It’s also important to note that transitions are sometimes more difficult than poses, so your student’s sense of comfort and ease may be compromised if you don’t follow your cues. No pressure. It’s just something to think about in advance, and everything should go smoothly.

• Bow – Lean on your leg
• Wheel: From Warrior Two, roll your arms and frame the front foot with your hands.
• Circle – circle your arm above your head.
• Cynch – Cinch the side waist away from the floor – the word was originally used in clothing making to gather the waistline of a skirt.
• Draw – Pull your arms above your head.
• Drape – Drape the body over the front leg.
• Extends to fingertips – Great word for “stretch” or “reach”.
• frame – Frame the front foot with your hands and pee on the fingertips.
• Flex – Flex your toes towards the ceiling
• float – Float the hips upward
• Floint – Float the feet (a combination of flexion and toe)
• Gather – Gather the side of the waist away from the floor.
• Slide – Slide your arms slowly and carefully as if you were moving them through molasses.
• Hinge – Exhale, lean forward, starting from your sit bones to hang at your hips
• Hollow – Armpit Hollows – Excellent cue to activate the upper trapezius in Downward Dog and Handstands.
• Shimmy – Move the hips from side to side, moving intuitively as you feel and feel into them.
• propagated – wide toes
• Stamp – Tap the front foot down.
• To flow – Sinking into the hips, allowing them to open and release
• Squeeze – Squeeze the scapula together, activating the rhomboids And feel the collarbones open
• Tee-pee – Pee on your fingertips
• Melt – Melt the heart towards the earth.
• Rotate – Rotate your hips towards the long side of the mat
• Place – call me old fashioned, but sometimes it works
• Socket – Plug the femur into the hip socket
• Reach – Reach fingertips (i.e. extend)
• To roll – Roll your legs towards the midline
• Turn – Rotation hips Before
• Change – Move the hip bones forward on ankle bones
• To pull – Pull your arms back.
• Spiral – Spiral rotation along the spine
• Smear – Run your hand across your chest and reach your fingers toward the sky
• Sweep – Sweep arms up air
• Relax – Relax your torso forward (coming out of a twist)
• Wave – Shake your spine forward to do a plank
• Windmill: From the leaning crescent (right leg forward), exhale and slide your hands behind your hips. Inhale, extend left arm forward and rotate arms while rotating hips toward the long side of the mat for Warrior Two.
• Yawn – From Downward Dog, inhale with your right leg high, exhale, bend your knee And kick your right heel to your left glute. Yawn with your hip open and you reach your right knee toward the sky.

ISOMETRIC REFINEMENT INDICES – movements that do not change the angle of a joint or create any movement from A to B, but it can refine and great modify our inner experience of the pose.

In my experience, these cues are more difficult for new teachers to understand. Movement indices A to B are more important, but not more important. Isometric cues are refinement cues and are often used to create muscle activation in poses and simultaneously align with functional joint movement. This is the tofu of sambo. Dry bread is not enough. We need that little extra to flesh it out and make the experience interesting.

• Allow – Let the shoulder blades go down the back
• Expand – Widen the clavicles by retracting the scapula toward the spine.
• Claw – Claw your fingertips to activate Hasta Bandha
• Hang out – Slide the heel to the wide end of the mat without moving the foot (to activate the abductors)
• Pull on the legs – Ideal for activating the quads
• Squeeze the back of the calf forward over the shin (in standing poses with straight legs, especially suitable for students with drooping arches and who hyperextend the knee)
• Tighten the legs in the midline to lift them towards the trunk: Excellent isometric signal to activate the central meridian
• Knit the front ribs inwards and downwards to connect to the kernel.
• Engage the pelvic floor -Mula Bandha
• Elongate the nape of the neck
• Magnetize – Magnetize the heels toward each other to create muscular energy through the legs to the core (great in poses like Goddess and Warrior Two)
• Pin the belly button towards the spine – Great signal to maintain lower belly connection
• Press – Dig the little toes into the dirt to rotate the legs inward (in Cobra or Camel where the foundation is on the front of the ankle)
• Root – Continue to root yourself in the triangle of your feet, to align the femur, pelvis and spine.
• Scissors – Scissor (adduct) the inner thighs toward the midline to activate the core.
• scoop – Bring the lower abdomen towards the navel (Uddiyana Bandha activation)
• Soften – Soften the jaws and widen the upper palette
• Screw – Imagine holding two jam jars and screwing them together to activate hasta bandha