By Sue Heron – Training Co-ordinator Tatty Bumpkin and Paediatric Physiotherapist
Find your local Tatty or Baby Bumpkin class at http://www.tattybumpkin.com/classes/find-class.html and have a go Elephant pose with your baby, toddler or child at home – see below for ideas and games.
The Adventure This Week ..
This week Tatty/Baby Bumpkin find themselves outside a big, white tent. Just what could be going on inside?
It’s a circus – with elephants, tight rope walkers, clowns and lions …
The elephants spray water high up into the air, the tight rope walker balances with care on the high wire and the lions roar mightily!
However, the best act is saved till last - it's Tatty Bumpkin on a giant trampoline! The crowd go wild as she somersaults in the air. Will she be able to touch the top of the tent…?
Why not come and find out what is going on inside the Big Top at your local Tatty or Baby Bumpkin class…
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| Elephants by the water hole! |
In the ‘Circus Story’ Your Child Will Have the Opportunity To
1. Stretch out their muscles in the elephant and tent poses.
2. Develop their balance skills as they walk down their ‘tightropes’ and do circus tricks!
3. Use gestures or words to express their thoughts i.e. Feeling
- ‘Curious’ with Tatty Bumpkin and Cat as they look at the tent.
- ‘Anxious’ with Tatty Bumpkin as she watches the tightrope walker and the lions.
- ‘Excited’ with Tatty Bumpkin as she sees the elephants and has a go on the trampoline!
4. Talk about their ideas on:
- What shape tent to be?
- How to balance the cups and plates as clowns?
- What trick to do on their tightrope?
- Develop their sense of rhythm, and co-ordination skills, as they move as heavy elephants to the Tatty Bumpkin Rhythm Track.
5. Have fun with their friends whilst: being an elephant train, ‘eating’ popcorn, bouncing Tatty Bumpkin on the trampoline and finally taking the train home to Wobble Farm.
Elephant Pose for Children and Toddlers
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| Elephant Pose for You! |
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| Elephant Pose for Children |
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| Elephant Pose with Your Toddler |
How to do Elephant Pose with your Child or Toddler.
If your child is about 3 or 4 years old or younger they will be relying on vision a great deal to learn new movements. Therefore it is best to do Elephant pose with them so they can see what to do. Also research is increasingly showing that children bond with their parents through movement as well as touch.
- Start by doing the ‘Elephant Ears’ pose yourself to stretch and relax your shoulders, arms and hands. Sit or stand up tall and place your hands on your waist. Then, keeping your hands on your waist, slowly roll your shoulders backwards and outwards, to stretch out your lower neck and upper chest muscles. To increase the stretch try doing slightly bigger shoulder rolls.
- Do about 3-4 shoulder rolls backwards and outwards then do one shoulder roll in the opposite direction i.e. forwards and inwards. Finish by taking your hands off your waist and giving your shoulders, arms and hands a gentle shake.
- Now it is your child’s go! Together, follow the actions of the Elephant rhyme below to make the movements playful and fun. See the ‘why it is good for me’ section for why this is important.
Other Games to Play in Elephant Pose
Elephants spraying water!
1. Clear a space in a room or outside. Find a bucket sized empty container and some blue pieces of fabric or ribbon for you both to play with. Keep the streamers short so your child cannot wrap them completely round their neck. The bucket will be your ‘waterhole’ and the streamers will be your ‘elephant water’. Never leave your child unsupervised with their streamer.
2. Hold the streamer in one hand and stretch out your arm like an elephant’s trunk to spray the water.
3. Wave your streamer high above your head then ‘dip’ it down into the bucket as if to ‘suck’ up more water. Lift your streamer out of the bucket and wave it over your head again – to spray your water all around! Do big, clear movements so your toddler is encouraged to copy you.
4. As you do the actions make swishing ‘water’ sounds and, once again, encourage your toddler to copy you.Reinforce your toddler’s movements by saying the words ‘up’, ‘down’, ‘in’ or ‘out’ as they do the relevant actions.
Carry on playing with the streamer, and firing your child’s imagination, by showing them all the different ways you can play with your ‘water streamers’ i.e.
- Wrapping the streamer round your wrist or leg and then waving your arm or leg.
- Pretending to ‘wash the windows’ with your water streamer.
- Pretending to wash each other with your water streamers – saying the body parts as you ‘wash’ them.
- Sitting down and threading the streamer between your toes – then waving your foot in the air to wave the streamer.
Encourage your toddler to come up with their own play ideas. Show them alternatives if they do wrap the streamer round their neck!
Why Elephant Pose is Good for Both and your Child or Toddler
As you do Elephant pose with your child or toddler you will have a chance to:
1. Stretch and gently activate your shoulder and arm muscles.
Elephant pose is another great activity to do with your baby or toddler after they have been sitting in a car seat and have not had the chance to stretch out their shoulders and arms for a while. As they do the actions to the elephant rhyme by themselves they will be stretching and strengthening their shoulder and arm muscles even more effectively.
The ‘Elephant Ears’ stretch for carers will give you the chance to stretch out your neck and chest muscles. These muscles are often prone to tightness as you lift and care for your baby or toddler.
2. Stretch and gently activate your back and tummy muscles.
As you both move in elephant pose you will be firstly strengthening your tummy muscles, as you lean forward, and then strengthening your back muscles as your straighten up.
3. Play and interact with each other to progress your child’s early physical and learning skills.
As you play with your child, either doing the ‘Elephant rhyme’ or being ‘Elephants spraying water’, you will be helping them to progress both their physical and learning skills. Recent research (1) shows that:
- Movement skills are enhanced through play and early playful movements form the basis of more complex skills. In this version of Elephant pose version you will be helping your child to develop their balance and eye-hand co-ordination. These movements will provide the foundations for actions such as: hitting a ball with a bat or racquet or looking up at a whiteboard and then down at a piece of paper in a classroom situation.
- Babies and young children, when given the chance to get involved in active play with others during their day, produce smaller amounts of a stress hormone called cortisol. Consistently high levels of cortisol have been found to damage nerve cells in the brain. Hence playful activities appear to protect baby’s and young children’s brains.
- Babies and toddlers are able to do simple ‘cause and effect’ or problem solving games (such as pressing a button to make a toy work) more easily if their parents have regularly played games with them involving toys or other objects. When playing with the blue ‘water streamer’ your baby or toddler will learn how they can affect the movement of it by batting, waving or reaching for it.
- When parents play with their baby or young child, rather than just do a series of movements with them, they tend to use far more gestures, sounds and facial expressions – all of these have been found to greatly help early communication skills.
4. Progress your child’s early ‘movement planning ‘skills.
As your child follows the Elephant rhyme and plays with their ‘water streamer’ in different ways they will be constantly adjusting their body posture and hand grip. This ability to change body and hand position quickly and smoothly in a sequence to do an activity is crucial for more complex skills such as dressing or eating.
1.National Center for Physical Development and Outdoor Play (2010). From Playpen to Playground – The Importance of Physical Play for the Motor Development of Young Children. www.headstartbodystart.org.
Elephant Pose for Babies
Younger Babies
N.B. Remember, when you are doing the poses with your baby, never force the movements and keep looking at your baby to make sure they are comfortable. If you feel any resistance, or your baby becomes unsettled, do stop. Once your baby has settled, gently try the pose again, perhaps making clicking sounds or using a toy to distract them. If your baby remains unsettled, do not persist with the pose, instead ask your Baby Bumpkin teacher for advice.
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| Flap your baby elephant ears! |
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| Elephant pose for you |
This adaptation of Elephant pose is ideal if your baby is about 5 mths or younger and has yet to gain good control of their head and upper body in sitting.
- Sit with your baby on a mat or floor space – settling them on their backs in front of you.
- Whilst keeping eye contact with your baby, first give yourself a stretch by doing the ‘Elephant Ear’ pose. This activity will loosen up your shoulders, arms and hands and therefore help you to hold and guide your baby in a more relaxed way. Sit up tall and place your hands on your waist. Then, keeping your hands on your waist, slowly roll your shoulders backwards and outwards, to stretch out your lower neck and upper chest muscles. To increase the stretch try doing slightly bigger shoulder rolls.
- Do about 3-4 shoulder rolls backwards and outwards then do one shoulder roll in the opposite direction i.e. forwards and inwards. Finish by taking your hands off your waist and giving your shoulders, arms and hands a gentle shake.
- Now it is your baby’s go! Baby Bumpkin Elephant pose follows the Elephant rhyme to make the movements playful and fun. See the ‘why it is good for me’ section on why this is important.
Older Babies
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| Flap your elephant ears whilst sitting |
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| Elephant pose for you! |
This adaptation of Elephant pose is ideal if your baby is about 5 mths or over and they are able to sit happily on your lap either being supported round their hips or with just their hands being held.
If you do Elephant pose in front of a mirror your baby will be able to see you and their arm movements as you both do elephant pose. Or ask a partner to sit in front of your baby and do the actions to Elephant pose along with your baby – this will encourage your baby to do the actions as well as making it fun.
- Find a comfortable place to sit on the floor with your baby.
- Settle your baby so they are sitting on the floor in front of you, then they can lean back against you for support if they wish.
- Start by doing the ‘Elephant Ears’ pose yourself to stretch and relax your shoulders, arms and hands. Sit up tall and place your hands on your waist. Then, keeping your hands on your waist, slowly roll your shoulders backwards and outwards, to stretch out your lower neck and upper chest muscles. To increase the stretch try doing slightly bigger shoulder rolls.
- Do about 3-4 shoulder rolls backwards and outwards then do one shoulder roll in the opposite direction i.e. forwards and inwards. Finish by taking your hands off your waist and giving your shoulders, arms and hands a gentle shake.
- Now it is your baby’s go! Baby Bumpkin elephant pose follows the Elephant rhyme to make the movements playful and fun. See the ‘why it is good for me’ section on why this is important.
Other Games to Play in Elephant Pose with Your Baby
Elephants spraying water!
1. Find a length of fabric for the ‘water’. If your baby is younger, black and white or black and yellow striped fabric is helpful as they will clearly see these colours. If your baby is older, try a blue, sparkly fabric to represent the water.
2. Make sure your baby is comfortable and well supported in lying or sitting then wave the streamer slowly in front of them.
3. Give your baby time to ‘see’ the streamer and encourage them to follow it with their eyes so they turn their heads.
4. Then encourage your baby to reach up or out for the streamer with their hands to either ‘bat’ or to grab it.
5. If your baby is nearly able to roll over by themselves you can use the streamer to encourage them to roll onto their tummy. Make sure your baby is looking at the streamer, then slowly take it over to one side just above their shoulder level. Hopefully your baby will follow the streamer with their eyes, then they will turn their heads and finally their bodies towards it. Help your baby to complete their roll by bringing their opposite arm and hip across their body in the direction they are rolling.
Remember to never let your baby alone with the streamer but, once they have rolled onto their tummy, continue to let your baby explore the streamer by batting it or reaching for it.
Why Elephant Pose is Good for Both You and Your Baby
As you do Elephant pose and rhyme with your baby, you will give yourself and your baby a chance to:
1. Stretch and gently activate your shoulder and arm muscles.
Remember if your baby is under 5 mths they will not have full movement at their shoulders so never force the actions. However by just doing the movements that your baby is comfortable with will provide them with a good, gentle stretch. Hence Elephant pose is another great pose to do with your baby after they have been sitting in a car seat for a while and have not had the chance to stretch out their shoulders and arms. When your baby starts to do more of the actions by themselves they will be stretching and strengthening their muscles even more effectively.
The Elephant Ears stretch for carers will give you the opportunity to stretch out your neck and chest muscles. These muscles are often prone to tightness as you lift, feed and care for your baby.
2. Play and interact with each other to progress your baby’s early physical and learning skills.
As you play with your baby, doing the Elephant rhyme and playing with the ‘water streamer’, you will be helping them to progress both their physical and learning skills. Recent research (1) shows that:
- Specific movement skills can be enhanced through play. In Elephant pose you will be helping your baby develop their reaching and kicking skills.
- Early playful movements form the basis of more complex skills. The batting and reaching movements your baby does as part of Elephant pose will provide them with the foundations for later, more complex arm movements such as throwing.
- Babies and young children, when given the chance to get involved in active play with others during their day, produce smaller amounts of a stress hormone called cortisol. Consistently high levels of cortisol have been found to damage nerve cells in the brain. Hence playful activities appear to protect a baby’s brain.
- Even babies as young as 2 mths are able to do simple ‘cause and effect’ or ‘problem solving’ games more easily if their parents had regularly played games with them using toys or objects. When they playing with the ‘water streamer’ your baby will be learning how they can affect its movement by batting it or reaching out to grab it.
- When carers play with their baby, rather than just do a series of movements with them, they tend to use far more gestures, sounds and facial expressions – all of these have been found to greatly help their baby’s early communication skills.
1.National Center for Physical Development and Outdoor Play (2010). From Playpen to Playground – The Importance of Physical Play for the Motor Development of Young Children. www.headstartbodystart.org.
Make it Multi-Sensory, Educational & Fun
In Tatty and Baby Bumpkin classes we use unique storylines to make the activities meaningful and to fire the imagination.
All our classes are multi-sensory comprising of:
- Adapted yoga poses and activities which both stimulate and calm the body senses
- Dedicated songs and rhythms which are relevant to the stories
- Bespoke hand-woven props to look at and feel. Tatty Bumpkin has its own range of fairly traded animal props to back up the yoga poses and bring the stories to life. Our teachers are supported to use natural props in the classes which are great to feel as opposed to smooth plastic
We have carefully linked each Tatty and Baby Bumpkin to the new 2012 Early Years Foundation Stage framework. Importantly supporting children to learn ‘how to learn’ not just focusing on what on they learn.
Find your local Tatty Bumpkin class at http://www.tattybumpkin.com/classes/find-class.html
