New Leaf Foundation is a leader in Canada making yoga and mindfulness-based practices available to youth in marginalized communities in order to support their mental, emotional and physical health. Our organization has spent the last 9 years delivering long-term, sustainable programming to youth in some of the least serviced communities and facilities in southern Ontario, including within primary and secondary schools, custody facilities, gang-exit initiatives and homeless shelters.
Join us for this online training where New Leaf will share our best practices for making yoga accessible and relevant for young people in diverse and sensitive environments. The training primarily focuses on approaches for youth aged approximately 12-20 but the material can be adapted for younger age groups or other demographics.
Course starts October 17, 2016
Tuition: $325
All proceeds go to support our youth programs. Limited sliding scale spaces are available. Complete this form to apply for sliding scale.
Curriculum
- Introduction and Anti-Oppression Practices
- Holding Space and Healthy Boundaries
- Understanding Trauma
- Teaching Methodology
- Building a Class
- Youth Engagement and Working with Challenges
What you will learn
- Understand the importance of anti-oppression practices in yoga service work
- Learn a trauma-informed framework for offering yoga and mindfulness-based practices
- Recognize behavioral issues from a trauma-informed perspective
- Develop skills for engaging youth, working with resistance and other challenges
- Build the capacity for active listening, healthy boundaries, and strengths and resilience -based approaches
- Design sessions utilizing New Leaf’s class model
- Learn tips for starting a program
How does the course work?
- 6 modules
- Video, audio, and written content
- 15 hours of learning
- 6 weeks of support via discussion forum
- Final quiz and assignment
- New Leaf’s Teaching Guide (PDF)
- Certificate of Completion
This online training is designed to be as accessible as possible - learn from your own home, on your own schedule. The course includes 6 modules with videos of varying lengths, as well as reading materials, including a copy of New Leaf’s Teacher Guidebook. Between watching videos, reading, practice, and reflection, this training is approximately 15 hours.
You have the option of completing a final quiz and assignment. The quiz and assignment will include multiple choice and reflection questions and will be reviewed by a New Leaf Senior Staff. Upon submission and review of your quiz, you’ll receive a certificate of completion.
Who is this training for?
Yoga teachers, yoga teachers-in-training and/or experienced yoga practitioners in professions that serve youth (i.e. school teachers, youth workers) wanting a better understanding of trauma, anti-oppression practices, and how to offer mindfulness and yoga-based practices to youth.
FAQ
No, this online training is not a yoga teacher certification and is designed to serve as an add-on to a foundational yoga teacher training. The course is offered with an assumption that basic understanding of yoga anatomy and philosophy is understood, and the tools presented are designed to equip teachers to modify how they offer yoga to be suitable and relevant for young people.
No, New Leaf Foundation teachers are individuals who are hired by the organization and facilitate our direct programming.
We recommend that anyone offering yoga to youth is a certified yoga teacher with a minimum of 200 hours of training. Depending on the extent of your own personal yoga experience combined with the amount of experience you may have working with youth, this training may equip you to offer basic mindfulness and yoga-based tools to youth. It is important to always be transparent about how many total hours of related training you possess when approaching a program site.
Faculty
The primary instructors for this training are Laura Sygrove and Julia Gibran, with guest faculty Jamilah Malika, and Andre Talbot. They have years of combined mindfulness/yoga practice and experience supporting and working with youth in under-served environments.
Laura Sygrove is Co-founder and Executive Director of New Leaf. She brings 9 years of experience developing New Leaf programming, training teachers, studying trauma-informed approaches to offering yoga, and working primarily with youth in custody.
Julia Gibran is Teaching Direction with New Leaf and has been teaching yoga in studios and to youth for almost a decade. Her degree in education fuels a passion for social activism and offering yoga to youth who have experienced trauma.
Jamilah Malika is a Senior Program Facilitator and Teaching Mentor at New Leaf, published author/poet, ex-performing artist, yoga teacher, and community educator. She was a co-visionary of the Positive Space Initiatives at a downtown Toronto yoga studio. Her teaching experience includes teaching youth writing and performance poetry in schools, arts/activism programs, and guiding groups on the fringes of yoga studios.
Andre Talbot is a Teaching Mentor with New Leaf. After a 10-year career as a professional football player, he found solace and transformation through the practices of yoga, mindfulness, and meditation. He has since been dedicated to sharing these practices with youth in the communities that need it most. Andre is also co-founder of Spirit Loft, a local Toronto-based yoga and movement studio.
“The material is delivered by people who are clearly dedicated and passionate about what they’re talking about…”
“The discussions around privilege, oppression, and trauma have really stayed with me and will inform the way I teach/practice/relate to the world…”
“I found the trauma section really helpful in understanding trauma as a physiological response and how I could think that through in my class planning.”
“It is such a breath of fresh air to connect anti-o practices and yoga! Thank you for giving me the space to explore this!”
“The discussion forum helped to round out the content and give it real-world context. This is where learning flourishes for me - in community.”
“Great platform for learning, especially for students like myself who have irregular and at times time-demanding life situations…”
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