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Kansas City, MO (KCTV) — Armani Dorch and his classmates are learning superhero yoga.
“It makes you peaceful not mad again and sometimes you even do it when you’re not even mad,” Dorch said.
He goes to the Academy for Integrated Arts Charter School on Troost Avenue. It’s a mindful school.
“We believe that our work includes addressing the whole child, so we believe it’s important to attend to social-emotional learning, as social-emotional learning helps children to be successful academically,” executive director Tricia Degraff said.
She says all students from pre-K to sixth grade take one 30-minute yoga class a week with a certified instructor. Teachers can also take yoga too.
The superhero yoga program was added to the curriculum last school year and students are already reaping the benefits.
Armani takes his practice into the classroom to help him during tests.
“I was feeling scared, kind of nervous. I didn’t wanna be kind of nervous,” Dorch said.
He’s not the only student it’s helping.
“We do have students who, a year ago, were needing extra layers of support who know do not need those extra layers of support nearly as much as they once did as they’ve been able to internalize some of those strategies that they’ve been taught,” Degraff said.
Janis King founded superhero yoga. She’s dedicated to bringing the practice to kids at under resourced schools in the Kansas City area.
“We did research when we were first in the school every class checking on the kid’s emotional self-assessment before and after yoga and consistently every time they left the room calmer, centered, more focuses, more ready to learn,” King said.
She says kids get the benefits of yoga in the moment but it also helps in the long run too.
“A lot of the current research shows that if kids take time to breathe and practice yoga during the day on a regular basis there are physiological changes within their body it actually changes the structure of their brain,” King said.
In this safe space where they practice, Armani and his friends are learning about their bodies, feelings and their minds.
They close each class out with the mantra, “kind hearts, kind words, kind thoughts.”
King is working to bring superhero to more schools in the metro. She says the program is a non-profit and donation based.
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