If you’ve ever tried teaching yoga to a room full of 5-year-olds, you know it’s a joyful challenge. Kindergarteners are imaginative, energetic, and wonderfully wiggly…which means traditional grown-up yoga just doesn’t work.

We believe in meeting our students where they are by using music, play, and storytelling to make yoga accessible, inclusive, age-appropriate and super fun for young kids.

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Why Yoga for Kindergartners?

You’ve probably heard the popular phrase, “Everything I need to know, I learned in kindergarten.” It’s true - kindergarten is where children begin building the lifelong foundations for learning and social interaction. It’s also a time of big transitions: separating from family for a full school day, learning to share space and attention with peers, following multi-step directions, and managing overwhelming feelings in a group setting.

That’s a lot for a 5-year-old!

Enter yoga for kids. Yoga is more than movement…it’s also a toolkit for the classroom. It helps kindergartners (and kids of all ages):

Regulate big emotions when frustration, excitement, or worry feel too big to handle.
Build focus and attention in short, playful bursts that prepare them to listen and learn.
Develop body awareness and coordination as their motor skills are rapidly growing.
Gain confidence by trying new poses and celebrating effort over perfection.
Practice empathy and cooperation through partner poses, songs, and group activities.

group of kindergarteners practicing belly boat yoga pose

And here’s the best part: when yoga is blended with music, storytelling, and imagination, it stops feeling like a lesson and becomes learning through play. A roaring lion, a growing tree, a slithering snake aren’t just yoga poses, they’re elements of an adventure. For kindergartners, and learners of all ages, play is learning.

When we bring yoga into kindergarten classrooms, teachers tell us it helps with transitions, reduces behavior struggles, and creates a calmer, more connected learning environment. For children, it feels like fun and freedom. For educators, it’s a strategy that supports both academic and social-emotional growth.

Best Practices for Teaching Yoga to Kindergartners

Yoga for early learners doesn’t look like adult yoga and that’s by design. It’s important that the lesson, expectations and instructional language all be age-appropriate. Here are some of our favorite tips…

Keep it short and sweet. Thirty to forty-five minutes is often enough. Attention spans are still developing, so short sessions build consistency without overwhelm. Yoga brain breaks can be less than five minutes and super effective!
Use visual cues, props and storytelling to guide movement. Poses become much more engaging when kids imagine being animals, trees, or superheroes.
Encourage children to use their imagination by creating an adventure and welcoming their ideas.
Incorporate songs, chants, and repetition to build engagement and retention.
Be prepared with a great lesson plan but also stay flexible and respond to the energy in the room.

kindergarten kids yoga class warrior pose

Engaging Poses and Activities

At five years old, children are bursting with energy, imagination, and curiosity. But they’re also learning big skills like emotional regulation, balance, focus, and social cooperation. Yoga poses and activities for kindergartners need to be playful and accessible, while still supporting these crucial milestones.

Here are five of our favorite poses, songs, and games that bring yoga to life in kindergarten classrooms:

🦁 Lion’s Breath (with Sleepy Lion Game)

Have kids kneel, take a big inhale, and roar on the exhale like a lion. Not only do they love the silliness, but this exercise teaches breath awareness while giving them a safe way to release pent-up tension and big feelings.

Why does it work so well? The roar naturally lengthens the exhale, which activates the parasympathetic nervous system (the “rest and digest” state), helping kids feel calmer and more centered.

You can also play our Sleepy Lion Game! Kids start curled up in Child’s Pose as a “sleepy lion,” then rise into Upward Dog with a big ROAR. It’s the perfect combination of breath, movement, and imagination.

Get more fun and calming breathing exercises for kids that actually work!

🌳 Tree Pose (with “Grow” Song)

Start as a tiny seed and slowly “grow” into a tall tree, arms stretching like branches. To help children stay in the balance longer, you can add sound effects like wind rustling, rain falling, or birds chirping to make it even more imaginative. You might also incorporate props like scarves, leaves or flowers!

Tree Pose is more than balancing…it supports core strength, coordination, and focus. At age 5, children are developing the physical ability to balance on one leg and the mental ability to concentrate on a task for a short period of time. Tree Pose ties both together, giving them a fun challenge that builds confidence when they succeed.

We often practice tree pose with our Grow song, which layers music and movement onto the seed-to-tree cycle. This is a great example of how musical yoga naturally supports STEM learning. Kids embody the seed cycle while singing, moving, and imagining together.

Want more STEAM musical yoga? Help your students learn about the water cycle through movement and mindfulness!

🐍 Snake Pose

Lie on your belly, press hands into the floor, and lift your chest while hissing like a snake. Beyond lengthening and strengthening the spine and building coordination, Snake Pose (also called Cobra) is especially helpful for posture as it stretches the front of the body and shoulders. As children transition to spending more time sitting in chairs and at desks, their spines can get compressed and their shoulders rounded. This gentle beginner-friendly backbend helps counteract that.

And the hissss? It’s not just for fun. Extending the exhale with sound tones the vagus nerve, calming the nervous system and building self-regulation.

Get more fun animal yoga poses and songs for kids!

🎵 “Bought Me a Cat” Yoga Sequence

This Yo Re Mi favorite turns a cumulative folk song into a yoga adventure. As the verses add up with Cat, Cow, Dog, and more, kids practice rhythm, sequencing, and memory while embodying the animals.

But the real magic is in the improvisation. Kindergartners are ready for opportunities to lead their peers. Invite your students to add their own animals to the sequence, inventing new poses and sharing their ideas for movement. This transforms the activity from teacher-led to collaborative and child-centered, building creativity and welcoming student voice within a safe structure.

When we, as teachers, acknowledge that we have just as much to learn from the children as we have to share with them, it creates a learning environment fueled by agency, support and belonging.

Read more about the impact of belonging on learning.

🌈 Rainbow Relaxation

Ask any group of 5-year-olds their favorite color and at least half will likely say rainbow! We can help children transition into relaxation by asking them to lie down and imagine resting inside their favorite color.

Each color can represent a quality they can feel inside themselves:
❤️ Red = safe
🧡 Orange = creative
💛 Yellow = powerful
💚 Green = loving
💙 Blue = expressive
💜 Violet = wise

It’s so important to give kids this age tools for winding down and guided visualization and relaxation are some of our favorites. You can add chimes or peaceful music to help kindergartners to practice calm.

Pair this rainbow relaxation with our I Am A Rainbow song complete with affirmations and power poses for an entire rainbow-themed kids yoga class!

Storybook Yoga: Where Literacy Meets Movement

One of the most magical ways to bring yoga into kindergarten classrooms is through stories. At this age, children are natural storytellers. They love pretending, imagining, and making connections between words and the world around them. Storybook yoga taps into that magic, blending literacy with movement, music, and mindfulness.

When we read a story together, children don’t just sit and listen…they move through the story with their bodies. A seed becomes a tiny curl in Child’s Pose. A giraffe grows tall in Mountain. A roaring lion comes alive with Lion’s Breath. Suddenly, literacy isn’t just about words on a page. It’s embodied, playful, and unforgettable.

Some of our favorite kindergarten pairings include:

The Tiny Seed by Eric Carle → students “plant” themselves in the ground, grow into trees, and sway in the wind, learning about the seed cycle while strengthening their bodies.
Giraffes Can’t Dance by Giles Andreae → a joyful way to practice self-expression and resilience, moving through different animal-inspired poses as kids learn that everyone can find their own rhythm.

Storybook kids yoga supports:

Literacy + Comprehension - children retain more when they act out the story.
Sequencing + Memory - moving in order helps them recall events and language.
Confidence + Self-Expression - embodying characters gives every child a voice.

When we invite kids to become part of the story, the book becomes a full-body experience they’ll remember, repeat, and retell.

Creating a Supportive Environment

Creating a supportive environment for kindergartners in yoga means redefining what “success” looks like. Wobbly, imperfect, giggly poses? Exactly right. Relaxation that’s hit-or-miss? Totally normal. A kids yoga class will never be 45 minutes of calm silence…it’s active, expressive, and joyful. We earn stillness through big movements, silly sounds, and lots of chances for kids to let their energy flow.

When we embrace the wobble, the wiggle, and the laughter, we create a space where children feel safe, seen, and free to be themselves. We offer choices so children feel empowered. And we invite collaboration so kids can share their own ideas and surprise us (and themselves) with their creativity! That’s where the real magic, and learning, happens.

Kindergarten is all about building a strong foundation for future learning. With music, movement, and mindfulness, we can give children not just poses, but lifelong tools for well-being.

Next Steps for Educators

Ready to bring more music, movement, and mindfulness into your classroom? Whether you’re a classroom teacher, school counselor, or yoga pro, you don’t have to reinvent the wheel. With Yo Re Mi, you’ll have the tools, songs, and strategies to bring music, movement, and mindfulness into your teaching and watch your students thrive.

Our Children’s Yoga Teacher Certification is designed to help educators like you learn how to teach kids yoga with confidence and joy!

Learn More about Kids Yoga Certification

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