Tallulah the Owlet Kids Yoga Class Plan - by Cosmic Kids Yoga by cosmickids1

Tallulah the Owlet Kids Yoga Class Plan Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s time for a special test at Owl school - the Wisdom Test! The only problem is that Talullah the Owlet (a baby owl) has no idea what wisdom means! So how can she pass the test? We go with Talullah on a quest to discover the MEANING OF WISDOM and learn some super cool MINDFULNESS TECHNIQUES along the way. You need a bell or chime for this story...

Set in the forest

Story script

Learning what WISDOM means

Pose checklist

Best for 4 to 8 year olds

Watch Jaime leading this adventure on YouTube

Character image

Memory Game

Things to remember Print out copies of the Memory Game sheet. And bring scissors for the kids to cut out the squares.

ÂŠ Cosmic Kids 2019

Bring a set of chimes or a bell to ring - to play the listening game with the ginormous spider!

Tallulah the Owlet

Â© Cosmic Kids 2019

Tallulah the Owlet - Story Script

Today we’re off to meet a cute little Owlet - a baby owl - called Tallulah! Now we all know that owls are supposed to be ‘wise’. But poor Tallulah isn’t really sure what ‘wise’ means! We’re going to meet up with her and see if we can learn too.

So tonight we shall be camping in the woods! Let’s pack a backpack with everything we’ll need. Sitting with our legs out long we reach forward to touch our toes, maybe bending our knees a little. Then we lift our arms all the way up to open our backpack oooooop. Now we twist one way for a... tent. Come back to face forward to pop it in. Now we twist the other way for a... torch. And in it goes. Back the other way again for a... sleeping bag and finally twist again for a little camping stove so we can make ourselves a nice hot chocolate to stay warm. Mmmm.

Now let’s get ready to join Tallulah with some special Owl moves – we do some neck rolls so we can see in all directions (owls can move their necks round a lot further than us because they have 7 more bones in their necks than we do). We do some shoulder shrugs (up, down, up down, roll your shoulders shrug it out!) to fluff up our feathers. Owl’s have huge eyes – let’s put on our cosminoculars to make our eyes big. We make our eyes strong by doing our eye exercises - without moving our head, only using our eyes, we follow our thumb looking side to side, up and down and all the way around. Owls are nocturnal meaning they only usually come out in the dark. So let’s get our eyes ready for the dark by rubbing our hands together to make heat, then cupping our eyes with our palms. Ahh. It feels lovely and relaxing for our big strong owl eyes. We give everyone at home hugs goodbye then we ride on our bikes up into the forest where Tallulah the Owlet lives. It’s still daylight, which means Tallulah is asleep right now. So we set up camp while we still have light, before she wakes up.

We put up our tent. We’d better check the zipper! (Zip up and down pretending it’s stuck!) Then we set up some fire logs by crossing our legs and make a lovely toasty campfire. As the sun goes down we lie on our backs and look up at the sky as it changes colour. Turning from orange to lilac to a deep purply blue. This is dusk! There’s the moon! We stand up and say Hello moon. It’s just a little sliver of a moon. A crescent moon. So it looks a bit like a banana. And what a lot of sparkly stars! Wow – you look very twinkly doing your star pose.

(Owl hoot)

What’s that noise? Let’s kneel and rub our ears and see if we can stay calm as the noises of the night start to happen. (Owl hoot) There it is again! The owls are waking up.

We can see Tallulah the owlet perched on her branch (crouch with hands on our hips). She looks a bit wobbly up there – gripping on with her wiggly talons and her wings tucked back behind her. She spots us and all of a sudden, dives off the branch head first. Standing up, feet hip distance apart, folding forward. Oh dear, she looks like she’s going to crash! Tallulah crosses her wings (forward fold holding opposite elbows). Then she huddles up into a tiny ball before landing with a soft bump on her tail feathers. Like a big ball of fluff she rolls forward and backwards, forwards and backwards before coming to a dizzy stop in front of us!

Oh dear Tallulah! Still working on the flying then?! She clears her little beak with a blllllwwww (horse blow). “’Ello! Er. Yes! I’m all of a flap and a fidget at the moment. Did you know that owl’s are meant to be wise? Well I’m not sure I am. Tonight’s the night for my Wisdom Test at Owl school – and I can’t stop flapping and worrying about it!”

“We sometimes EXPECT the worst - before anything has even happened yet! Things usually turn out much better than you think! “

Well being in a flap certainly can’t be helping – let’s start by helping Tallulah get centred and relaxed. We show her how to do owl breaths. Kneeling we take a breath in and lift our wings up, then breathe out long and slow as we lower our wings back down again. We do this a few more times then sit nice and still. This is already helping enormously! Then we show her our clever secret trick to relax – we lie down, make our whole body as stiff as a board, then we let it go – all the tension, letting our bodies feel all floppy. We do this with Tallulah three times and by the third time she feels so much more relaxed. Now she isn’t in a flap, we can start working on Tallulah’s wisdom before it’s time for Owl school.

“Our body can become tense when we worry. worry.” We can relax our body and this helps us let go of any tension and

In the woods we come to the magical wishing tree (tree pose). This tree is very special and we can all make a wish for something good to happen. Let’s keep our hands at our hearts and see if we can maybe close our eyes in tree pose to make our wish! Tallulah wishes that she may find her wisdom. The tree shifts (tree pose other side) as the breeze passes through. But maybe it wasn’t the breeze! Maybe it was all of our wishes?!

As we leave the magical wishing tree we spot a large spiders web (star pose). In the middle we see a ginormous spider (spider pose). Psst Psst! The spider wants to speak to us. “So, it’s wisdom you want eh?...Well I had a student once who had a similar desire – young boy named Peter Parker.” Hang on! We know that name…isn’t he? “He went on to become a hero by the name of Spider Man on account of him learning to activate his Spider senses. You wanna learn?” We sit, our eyes, like Tallulah’s, wide and ready to learn. The spider positions itself, drawing the tips of its legs together (butterfly pose). “We start by activating your hearing spider sense. Listen to the bell, when you can no longer hear any sound after it chimes, lower your wings and hands to your lap. Ready?” There is a deep bell sound – we listen until we can’t hear it any more and then when we’re sure it’s gone, we lower our hands. Wow! We try it two more times. © Cosmic Kids 2019

As we finish the Spider’s clever exercise for our hearing she tells us “…remember, the less you speak, the more you’ll hear. This is the gift of the spider and to you young Tallulah something you will need to become a wise owl.” I think we’ll all do well from that exercise!

Now our spider sense hearing is activated it doesn’t take us long to hear the happy calls of a monkey. He is jumping along, and lands right in front of us! Ready with a big monkey jump? After 3 - 1,2,3 Ooo ah ah ah! It’s Mike the Cosmic Space Monkey! “The wisest folk I know really look and see what’s going on around them? They can even imagine the world from someone else’s point of view? Let’s give it a try…look over there. Can you see those leaves rustling about?”

Sure enough when we look closely we can see what’s making them move…it’s a mouse! She’s collecting seeds and berries from the ground in her cheeks. We imagine what she must be thinking – “How great that there’s some food here. I’d better collect it quickly before I get spotted. My babies will have some yummy dinner tonight. Hooray!!” Tallulah spots something else – “Look it’s a beetle! (happy baby) It’s enjoying a good scratch on it’s back!” We imagine what the beetle must be thinking…”OOoo. Yes! That’s it!!! That’s the spot! That feels sooo good. You can’t beat a good back scratch! Or a good jiggle of the legs!”

We look back at Mike our monkey friend who is sitting in a squat position. “If you can see and feel stuff from someone else’s point of view – that’s called compassion – and that, my friend is a quality of the wise.” With that nugget of wisdom he leaps off into the trees! Oooo ah ah ah! All of a sudden we hear a loud hoo hoo hoo. It’s the sound of the Owl school bell. Time for Tallulah to go and take her test. We quickly phone a friend - Popcorn the Dolphin! “Hi Popcorn! Any advice for Tallulah?” We listen to the answer on the other phone: “Yes…stay calm, keep breathing and THINK POSITIVE!” What great advice! We put the phone down. Bubo Bubo the Eagle Owl is perching high above the owlet students. Switching sides to do Eagle Owl on the other side. Her powerful talons grip the branch and she stays very still and balanced. “Your wisdom test begins now.”

Out of nowhere a snake slithers forward right in front of the owlets. They begin chattering, hooting and tooting nervously. Some of them bob their heads up and down (nodding) showing that they feel threatened by the snake. The snake hisses in reaction to the owlets becoming more stressed! But Tallulah manages to relax. She is still and silent. Breathing slowly to stay cool and calm As the others see her, so powerful in her stillness and focus, they copy and soon as they become calm. So does the snake – and it calmy slithers away.

“By listening, watching and feeling the situation from the snake’s point of view, we wisely decide how to behave.”

Bubo Bubo notices and spreading her huge wings wide, silently flies down to Tallulah. She lands and folds her big wings around Tallulah and hoots with pride “Thanks to Tallulah you have all passed your wisdom test – you paid attention and that is all - you have begun your journey to become wise owls.”

The owlets all two-itt tw-oo in celebration. But we can’t stop yawning! It’s been a long day! Time for us to leave the night owls to enjoy the rest of their evening while we crawl quietly into our tents and snuggle down for the night. Back in our tent we stir up some of our hot chocolate to enjoy before lying down to rest.

Relaxation

Let’s see if we can get ready for becoming wise – just like Tallulah. We practice our special relaxation trick – by making our bodies hard and stiff, then letting them go. That is how we learn what relaxation is. As we do this we let go of all our worries too. We breath with our hands on our tummies to feel the life inside us. These deep breaths helping us find calm peaceful power inside. Then we find stillness and in that we start to hear more. Our eyes close and our spider senses awake. We feel light and open. We let our thoughts pass through and we make a brave decision to just stay here in the stillness and see what happens. The courage to be wise. We can do this. Thinking positive – just as Popcorn tells us will help us always move through any difficult times.

Follow-on Activity - Training our memory muscles

In this activity we train our memory like it’s a muscle and put our powers of observation to the test.

Handout copies of the activity sheet along with scissors for the children to cut out the pictures. Each picture has a dashed line as a guide for where to cut. Next they need to turn all their pictures over and mix them around. Spread them out with the blank side facing up. Then see how quickly you can make the pairs, remembering what and where each picture is. Try it a number of times to see if more practice makes it easier.

As a follow-on to the Tallulah story, we train our powers of observation and memory which are both qualities of wisdom.

Then we lift our arms all the way up to open our backpack oooooop.

Back the other way again for a... sleeping bag...

...and finally twist again for a little camping stove so we can make ourselves a nice hot chocolate to stay warm.

Now we twist one way for a... tent. Come back to face forward to pop it in.

Let’s pack a backpack. Sitting with our legs out long we reach forward to touch our toes.

Tallulah the Owlet - Pose Summary

We do some neck rolls so we can see in all directions like owls.

Only using our eyes, we follow our thumb looking side to side, up and down & around.

Let’s put on our cosminoculars to make our eyes big like an owl.

Then we ride on our bikes up into the forest where Tallulah the Owlet lives.

We put up our tent.

We get our eyes ready for the dark by rubbing our hands together, then cupping our eyes.

We’d better check the zipper! (Zip up and down pretending it’s stuck!)

Now we twist the other way for a... torch. And in it goes.

We do some shoulder shrugs to fluff our feathers.

It’s time to go so we give everyone at home hugs goodbye.

Then we set up some fire logs by crossing our legs and make a lovely toasty campfire with our fingers.

We lie on our backs and look up at the sky as it changes colour.

There’s the moon! We stand up and say Hello moon.

*Owl hoot* What’s that noise? Let’s kneel and...

...rub our ears and see if we can listen! *Owl hoot* There it is again! The owls are waking up!

We can see Tallulah the owlet perched on her branch, gripping on with her wiggly talons and her wings tucked behind her.

She spots us and all of a sudden, dives off the branch head first.

Then she huddles up into a tiny ball before landing with a soft bump on her tail feathers.

Like a big ball of fluff she rolls forward and backwards, before coming to a dizzy stop in front of us!

She clears her little beak with a blllllwwww (horse blow). ”Tonight’s Wisdom Test at Owl school. I can’t stop worrying about it!”

It’s just a little sliver of a moon. A crescent moon. So it looks a bit like a banana.

Oh dear, she looks like she’s going to crash! Tallulah crosses her wings (forward fold holding opposite elbows).

Let’s help Tallulah get relaxed. We do owl breaths (breathing in an out) a few times then sit nice and still.

Then we do another relaxation. We lie down, make our whole body as stiff as a board...

...then we let it go – all the tension, letting our bodies feel all floppy. We do this with Tallulah three times and by the third time she feels relaxed.

And what a lot of sparkly stars! Wow – you look very twinkly doing your star pose.

In the woods we come to the magical wishing tree (tree pose). We all make a wish (eyes closed) for something good to happen.

The spider draws the tips of its legs together (butterfly pose) [Ready with the bell!]

When the bell rings – we listen until we can’t hear it any more and then we lower our hands to our laps. (3x)

As we leave the tree, we spot a large spiders web (star pose).

In the middle we see a ginormous spider (spider pose). She tells us about Spidey Sense!

We meet Mike! (Monkey We see a mouse (mouse jumps). “Wisdom is pose) and imagine what imagining the world she must be thinking. from someone else’s point of view.”

EV Mike is in a squat position. “If you can see and feel stuff from someone else’s point of view – that’s called compassion. That’s wise!

We see a beetle having a scratch (happy baby) and imagine what it’s thinking.

We quickly phone a friend - Popcorn the Dolphin! “Any advice?”

We sit, ready to learn.

Tallulah wishes for wisdom. The tree shifts (tree pose other side) - maybe it was our wishes?!

We listen to the answer on the other phone: “Yes… stay calm, keep breathing and THINK POSITIVE!”

With that nugget of wisdom he leaps off into the trees! Oooo ah ah ah!

Bubo Bubo the Eagle Owl is perching high above the owlet students. (Eagle Pose)

All of a sudden we hear a loud hoo hoo hoo. It’s the sound of the Owl school bell. Time for Tallulah to go and take her test.

Switching sides to do Eagle Owl on the other side. “Your wisdom test begins now.”

But Tallulah is still and silent. Breathing slowly to stay cool and calm. The others copy her.

So does the snake. It calmy slithers away.

The birds begin chattering, hooting and tooting nervously.

Some of them bob their heads up and down (nodding) showing that they feel threatened by the snake.

Out of nowhere a snake slithers forward right in front of the owlets.

Bubo Bubo notices and spreading her huge wings wide, silently flies down to Tallulah.

... before lying down to rest..

We crawl quietly into our tents and snuggle down for the night.

But we can’t stop yawning!

The owlets all two-itt tw-oo in celebration.

The snake hisses in reaction to the owlets.

She lands and folds her big wings around Tallulah. “Thanks to Tallulah you have all passed your Wisdom Test!”

Back in our tent we stir up some of our hot chocolate...

For more detailed guidance on how to instruct the poses, download our 253 page The Big Book of Kids Yoga Postures • • • • • •

220 kids yoga poses, including partner poses and breathing exercises 400 high quality pose images Clear, child friendly instructions into each posture Anatomical focus, benefits and contra-indications for each pose Teaching tips to make the poses work for kids A linking index to each pose

Training our memory muscles!