Online Teacher Trainings in Anusara Yoga:
Ideas/Suggestions from the Anusara School of Hatha Yoga Curriculum Team

Table of Contents:
General Comments
–
100-Hour Immersion
–
100-Hour Teacher Training
–
300-Hour Teacher Training

GENERAL COMMENTS 

• In general, LIVE classes are always preferred over distance or online learning, but it is possible to have very successful online trainings.

• Most of us mainly have experience with the Zoom platform for online trainings, so when we talk about how to do online trainings, we’ll be referring to the features available on Zoom. Some features of Zoom that are useful for us include using either speaker or gallery view, the ‘screen share’ function that allows everyone to see the same document, and breakout rooms for small group work.
  • There is another platform that many online teachers are finding to be very useful. It is called “Teachable”. In the interest of being concise and because Zoom is apparently more widely used at this point, we will not discuss “Teachable” here, but it is worth looking in to. 

• The E-CAT can record the session, and all the students can view it later to review what was taught, so that is an advantage of online trainings. Also, students who have to miss a session can make it up by viewing the recording, but in that case the student must write a brief summary to confirm that the student did actually view the recording.  The E-CAT can supply simple guidelines for the student to follow when writing a summary. 

• When teaching live, we often schedule 6 to 8 hours of class time per day. A general suggestion is to schedule much less time per day for online teacher trainings. It is very challenging to sit in front of a computer screen for a long time.

• For a module that requires a minimum of 12 contact hours, such as Teaching with a Class Theme, consider a schedule something like this: six 2-hour sessions, either one per week for six weeks, or two per week for 3 weeks, or one 2-hour session per day for six days, or two per day over three days. There are a lot of other options, of course.

• The 300-Hour Anusara Teacher Training lists “minimum” hours per module. Even when the training is done live, the Curriculum Team strongly suggests that for the four modules about teaching an Anusara class – Theme, UPAs, Sequencing, and Observation and Adjustments, especially for Theme and the UPAs – the E-CAT schedule more than 12 hours. This would be true even more for an online training, because for these subjects, a lot will be lost in an online training.
  • One suggestion for how to use the hours beyond the minimum 12 for these modules is to schedule one or more “Teaching Practicums”, which are a time for the students to practice teaching what they are learning and receive feedback from the E-CAT. These extra hours beyond the required minimums are a great way to fill out a 300-Hour Teacher Training, and later in this document, we will provide some ideas about how to do this online.

• Sessions focusing on the practice of asana, whether in the 200-Hour or the 300-Hour Training, such as asana workshops in an Immersion or in teacher trainings about teaching asana, sessions about Observation and Adjustments, and other related subjects do not  easily or effectively lend themselves to online training, so for these, our community needs to talk about how to present these in an online setting, if that is even possible. We will offer some suggestions about it in this document.

• Likewise, sessions about teaching asana do not naturally lend themselves to online training, so we’ll have to discuss that in particular also.
  • Since practice teaching asana may be more challenging when done online, and this would include things like Observation and Adjustments exercises, perhaps a major activity is homework, that the students would practice teaching specific things during the time in between sessions, and each one would send a report to the teacher trainer about the practice, how it is going, and any questions they have. They could also do a short zoom video of doing any particular skill that you are teaching regarding asana practice or teaching and send it to the teacher trainer to see. One advantage of this Zoom world could be to liberally use recordings.

• Lecture/discussion can work very well online. Many teachers who have been presenting  content (such as philosophy, theory, etc.) via Zoom report that they can present much more quickly, thoroughly and efficiently on Zoom, without any feeling of rushing, because there can be less of a tendency for students to take the subject off track with unrelated contributions and questions (as tends to happen in a group setting). 

• Practices such as pranayama, meditation, bhavana/contemplation, mantra practices, and Svadhyaya can work very well online.

Please also refer to the School’s policy for online teacher trainnings:https://www.anusarayoga.com/online-teacher-training-policy/

100-HOUR IMMERSION

Students who want to practice Anusara Yoga usually begin by taking Anusara classes on a regular basis, and then they might attend weekend workshops. The next big step in the study and practice of Anusara Yoga is to register for a 100-Hour Immersion. Anusara Yoga teachers believe that the Immersion curriculum is a gem.  It offers a deep dive into the practice of Anusara Yoga, into the inspiring philosophy that underlies it, and an experience of being part of this community or kula. Much of a student’s experience of this is based on the live experience of doing asana in a group, with a skilled teacher, and living this amazing philosophy within the community of students and teachers, so a live Immersion would be much preferred over an online experience. 

With that in mind, it is possible to have an online Immersion. The Immersion curriculum is divided into three parts of 33 or 34 hours each. The main content elements of each part are:

1. 30% of the hours (10 of 34 in each part) are about philosophy 
2. Over 50% of the hours (18 of 34 in each part) are devoted to asana practice in the Anusara style, in particular, practicing with and studying the Universal Principles of Alignment (UPAs)
3. Small sections introduce the practices of pranayama and meditation
4. Two hours in each part are devoted to the introduction of anatomy as it relates to our asana practice

For each of the above main elements of the Immersion, some online teaching methods might be:

1. See the notes about teaching the Philosophy module below, but these hours could easily be presented online, using screen share, with whole group discussions and/or break out groups. Journal writing and contemplation activities could support this.
2. Also, see the notes below about the Pranayama and Meditation modules for ideas about teaching these parts of the Immersion. It is quite possible to explain these practices and teach them online.
3. The anatomy subjects could also be done online, though there are challenges. 
   • On the positive side, to present the features of anatomy, the E-CAT can screen share photos and refer to a good book that everyone purchases. 
   • The challenge arises when the E-CAT wants to show or demonstrate an element of anatomy, such as the spinal curves and how the UPAs influence them because it could be difficult for the students to see and understand what you are referring to when it is presented online, but we can make time for questions and go over things again if necessary.
     • It is important for the E-CAT to have their camera set up so that they can move easily between sitting (presenting theory and content) being on their yoga mat (to do a clear demo). They should present a good view of their whole body so the demo is clear. 
   • Another main activity when teaching anatomy is working with a partner to find physical landmarks, to see how muscles work, etc… This type of activity is much easier done in a live setting, but we can be creative about how to practice things online. One possible method is that in pairs in a breakout group, one student could tell the other one how to find points on their own body, such as place your thumbs on your two ASIS (anterior superior iliac spine), look and work together to understand. They could have the partner move their arms in different ways to demonstrate how the scapula moves, for example. Another possible activity is that the E-CAT demonstrates or designates an experienced student to demonstrate, then the E-CAT observes all the students in gallery view to see how they are doing. 

The most challenging element of teaching an Immersion online will undoubtedly be teaching asana. It can be done, but will the students receive it, and will their asana practice be transformed, as it often is in a live Immersion? Some activities that we could do online are:

• Lecture/discussion about the UPAs, about all aspects of something like Muscular Energy, can be done online, with the support of our manuals and screen share of the teacher’s handouts.
• Asana practice can be done online with these suggestions: 
  • As the Certified teachers deliver their instructions, they can use gallery view to best observe the students’ performance of the asana and the UPAs.
  • The teacher can then designate one student who is very familiar with their teaching to demonstrate the asanas.  The students can use ‘speaker’ view and ‘pin’ that person’s image to their screen so that they see this person performing the actions, while the teacher sees all the students in gallery view and calls out verbal adjustments.

The more subtle element of an Immersion is the experience of kula or community. It seems to be an experience of Shakti and Grace that arises by doing all the practices in a group setting, especially the asana practice (partner work is such an interesting element of this), and then in gathering before and after teaching sessions. However, we have also seen this kula experience arise online, both in an Immersion setting and with more experienced Anusara students and teachers in a Philosophy module. 

100-HOUR TEACHER TRIANING

One of ASHY’s Core Values is “Excellence defined by high standards, professionalism and a desire to learn”. Excellence in our teaching is such a big part of who we are, and the 100-Hour Teacher Training is where a new teacher begins to acquire the qualities and skills of an Anusara Yoga teacher. Thus, we have to question whether a 100-Hour Teacher Training can be done online in a way that does justice to our students, our community, and who we are. 

If it is going to be offered online, some ideas are below.

The main intention of this course is to learn all the basics about how to teach an Anusara Yoga asana class. Some main activities are:

1. Asana practices with “parenthetical teaching”, which means that for this audience of future teachers, the teacher trainer describes what she is doing while doing it. 
2. Information about the main skills for teaching an Anusara class:
   • Teaching with a theme includes creating a class plan and how to weave the theme into the asana part of class
   • Sequencing
   • Teaching with the UPAs
   • Observation and Adjustments
   • Various teaching skills that come under the title “Instructions”, such as using active instructions, linking instructions, etc. 
3. A small amount of time is devoted to teaching meditation and pranayama.
4. An important topic that is a major part of a teacher training is practice teaching in pairs, small groups, or teaching the entire group, putting into action what the students are learning about the above teaching skills

About each of the above, here are some ideas about how to teach that subject online:

1. Asana practices can be done online but it certainly is not ideal. For ideas about presenting them online, see the suggestions about this in the section about teaching the Immersion above.
2. Information can be conveyed and discussed online through mini-lectures, with screen shares of what is in the manual and the teacher’s notes.
   • Online, the teacher can present the essentials of creating a class plan, and the students can work on class plans during the online session and complete them for homework. The teacher can go over one or more Class Planning Templates with screen share, so this can be done online. The teacher can demonstrate weaving the theme into the asana part of class, both in the asana sessions and in short demonstrations, and we can talk about how to organize the practice teaching under number 4 below.
   • We can present Sequencing with the Manual and screen shares of our notes, and students can start creating sequences in class and finish for homework.
   • This is a big topic – cueing asana instructions and UPA instructions. Teacher and students can work together online, listing possible teaching cues, talking about different types of cues, and they can work in small breakout groups. The important thing is to then do the practice teaching.
   • Observation and Adjustments – this is a very important teaching skill in Anusara Yoga, and probably the most difficult one to demonstrate and practice teaching when we are not together in one room. A main suggestion is that the teacher have a volunteer student with him or her, to demonstrate observation, verbal adjustments and physical adjustments, and that each student have someone with them to be their ‘student’ to practice observation and adjustments on them. 
     1. A very important skill is to be teaching a group of students, to talk them into a pose and observe, adding the necessary verbal adjustments. Students can practice this in gallery view with others in breakout rooms, but it is not ideal. 
     2. This is an important skill, and it is an advanced skill, so even in a live setting, students will need lots of practice after the training to develop these skills. In an online training, perhaps this can be a major homework assignment, that they meet in groups online and practice what you do in the training.
     3. Since the practice of this skill is limited in an online setting, perhaps the Certified Teacher can emphasize some other skills or areas of knowledge, such as for a list of the 25 most common poses, everyone lists and discusses the most common misalignments, writes down 5 instructions to talk a beginner into each of those poses, and for each misalignment, list a verbal instruction to bring them into alignment. 
   • See Chapter 14 in the Teacher Training Manual about “Instructions”. The teacher can present one of these teaching skills, like using active instructions when talking students into a pose and when teaching the actions, and in breakout groups, they can practice their cueing.
3. The short sessions about teaching pranayama and meditation can be done online, presenting information with mini-lectures, and then in breakout rooms, students can pair up and practice teaching. See the suggestions in the modules below regarding that.
4. Practice teaching is such an important part of a teacher training. From the beginning, we ask students to pair up and teach poses to each other. In the breakout rooms, for this and other asana-related sessions, students need to have their mats ready for doing asana. 
   • One interesting aspect will be getting the students, when they are teaching, to not do the poses themselves, because as we all know, when they begin teaching, they will want to do the poses. Perhaps by practice teaching online, they might get out of that habit if they need to look at a gallery view and see if the others are doing what they ask them to do.
   • In many Anusara Teacher Trainings, the final exercise is that each student teaches about 20 minutes of a class and receives feedback. Certain skills can be easily observed online, such as the theme and the sequence. Observation and Adjustments not so well. One option, now that everyone is familiar with Zoom, is that the students do this on their own, with a couple of friends or family members as students, and the teacher can observe it and give feedback, or the teacher and the students can do so. This is often a community-building exercise at the end of the training, that the students enjoy the fruits of each other’s efforts during the training, so it might be nice for them to see the others teach.

300-HOUR TEACHER TRAINING

We have 9 required modules, and we are in the process of releasing a guide called “Therapeutic Applications of Anusara Yoga”, which can be an elective module, so we are going to talk about how to teach those 10 subjects online. We also have 2 other modules available for E-CATs to use as electives, Yoga for Seniors and Women and Yoga, but we won’t be discussing how to teach them here.

The following modules would be easier to do online:

• Philosophy
• Meditation
• Pranayama
• Teaching with a Theme could lend itself very well to online. The heart of this skill is the ability to link a Philosophy or Inspiration clearly and believably to physical action. This is largely a verbal skill that could be conveyed well via Zoom and with modified short demos – even something like a “seated shoulder opener” etc. Or the student can reposition their camera and teach 2 or 3 poses to demo the linkage of theme and asana. The students can then draft fuller class plans with written scripts for the theme, the UPA’s etc. 
• Anatomy lends itself quite well to online. There are so many fantastic online Anatomy trainings, so an E-CAT can attend one to see how others do it.

More challenging:

• Advanced Sequencing
• Methodology and Co-Mentoring

These seem most challenging to do online:

• Teaching with the UPAs
• Observation and Adjustments
• Therapeutic Applications 

Philosophy Module (24 hours minimum)

Overall, the Philosophy module may be the one that most lends itself to online training, because it does not necessarily involve asana practice or other live practice and teaching. 

• One reminder: students who have not taken the 200-Hour Teacher Training can also take this module.

Suggested Activities

• Some of the main activities that can be easily done on Zoom:
  • Invocation
  • Lectures with screen share of the teacher’s notes
  • Short meditations
  • Bhavana inquiries – take a meditation-like seated posture, center yourself, and the teacher can offer a question or questions for inquiry, such as “How would you apply this philosophical teaching to your life? Let your question settle into the deeper space, and after a minute or two of silent inquiry, pick up your journal and write what comes to you.” Bhavana can be followed by discussion in a breakout room. 
  • Journal writing
  • Breakout groups to discuss a bhavana inquiry, or what is being taught
  • Q and A or large group discussions
  • Other practices that might relate to the text you are studying (most often that would be the Pratyabhijnahrdayam): mantra japa, pranayama or breath practices, awareness practices
• Students can gain additional hours by taking online asana classes, which can be optional. The E-CAT can create class themes from the text. This would be a great way to embody the teachings in the text, and through the classes, the E-CAT can demonstrate teaching with a theme. Students can be given more than a total of 24 hours if they include these online asana classes.
• An exercise that can be done during the Zoom sessions is to discuss creating a class theme/plan that comes out of the text, and the students can spend time on Zoom, in small groups if you want, creating a class plan. Outside of the module’s hours, the students can teach their class plans and inform the E-CAT about it, but those noncontact hours would not count towards our 300-Hour Teacher Training.

Meditation Module (12 hours minimum)

This is another module that could easily be done online.

• This module is about both the practice of meditation and teaching the practice, so one possibility is to plan to do about 8 hours about the practice, which all students can attend, and then focus on teaching it for 4 hours, which would be only for those in the 300-Hour Teacher Training.

Suggested Activities:

• All of the main activities and related asana classes that are listed for the Philosophy module could be done in this module.
• A particular focus of this module would be the 3 main styles of meditation: open, focused, and integrated, which were introduced in the Immersion, so there will be various short practice sessions to demonstrate these. Also, other related practices can be demonstrated, such as “guided meditation”, what is the difference between bhavana, contemplation, and meditation, etc.
• For the teacher training, in our Student Handout, we offer two templates for teaching meditation, a 3-step template and a 4-step template. Discuss them, demonstrate how to do them, and then in breakout groups, each person can practice teaching.
• A teaching activity described in the Student Handout is “Using a class theme to create a meditation dharana”. The E-CAT can go over that, demonstrate how it works, and then ask students to use a class theme to create such a dharana, and then in breakout rooms, teach a few others your dharana. They can be asked to bring a favorite theme to the session.

Pranayama Module (12 hours minimum)

This is another module that could easily be done online.

• Like the Meditation module, this module is about both the practice of pranayama and teaching the practice, so one possibility is to plan to do about 8 hours about the practice, which all students can attend, and then focus on teaching it for 4 hours, which would be only for those in the 300-Hour Teacher Training.

Suggested Activities:

• All of the main activities and related asana classes that are listed for the Philosophy module could be done in this module.
• A particular focus of this module would be the various types of pranayama practices that were introduced in the Immersion, so there will be various short practice sessions to demonstrate these. 
• For the teacher training then, we focus on how to teach the methods, so there is the opportunity for many breakout sessions to practice that. The E-CAT can go from one group to another to offer guidance.

Teaching with a Theme Module (12 hours minimum)

This module could be done online, although it might require more homework to really do it justice.

Suggested Activities:

• The main activities in this module are:
  • Presentation of information, which can be done via Zoom
  • Demonstration teaching, which can be short sessions or full asana classes
  • Practice in creating class plans, including themes, which can be done on Zoom
  • Practice teaching
• So the main challenges are demonstration teaching and practice teaching.
  • Demonstration Teaching
  • Practice Teaching can be done in breakout rooms. However, practice teaching of a more full asana session is more challenging. 
  • The reality is that students teaching longer asana sessions is a challenge in live teacher trainings also, because there usually is not enough time for every student to teach longer sessions. So one suggestion is to teach the “Methodology and Co-Mentoring module before this one, and then for homework, require that they record a class that they teach, and mentor each other in the theme. They can also provide the link to the E-CAT to view, depending on their availability to do that.

Teaching Practicum – not a module but an adjunct to modules about teaching Anusara yoga

• One idea in relation to the four modules about teaching an Anusara class (Theme, UPAs, Sequencing, Observation and Adjustments) – schedule time for a Practicum. If we were having live meetings, that could be a full weekend that mostly would be time for each teacher to teach 15-20 minutes of a prepared class to a small group and receive feedback. Maybe the E-CAT could have a second senior teacher present, divide the class into two groups, and each one supervise the feedback. If you did it more than once, there could be a focus. For example, after teaching Theme and Sequencing, the feedback could focus on those two subjects.
• When you are meetly solely online, this could take several possible forms:
  • Each student/teacher could record a class and send it to the E-CAT for feedback. That would not be an efficient usage of the E-CAT’s time though.
  • The E-CAT could schedule a Practicum time on Zoom. The student could teach the training group on the Zoom platform, in gallery view, with the E-CAT observing, and then you could give immediate feedback.
• This kind of mentoring is very effective within the 300-Hour Teacher Training

Anatomy

Some of the main activities of this module are:

• Presentation of information. The teacher can use a book that everyone purchases. The Curriculum Team has provided 4 PowerPoint slide shows to use, or the E-CAT can create their own slide shows. With the ‘screen share’ option available on Zoom, this can easily be done online.
• A second main activity that might be done in online breakout groups is to practice teaching asana to one or two others in order to apply what they are learning about anatomy. For example, this might involve teaching a forward bend to one or two others, where they will teach the UPAs that are most important in forward bends, for example, and observe if the student can create the actions so that they move primarily from the pelvis and secondarily from the spine. This could be done in breakout groups.
• Another main activity is working with a partner to find physical landmarks, to see how muscles work, etcetera. This is a more challenging activity to do online. 
  • One possibility is that in pairs in a breakout group, one student could tell the other one how to find points on their own body, such as place your thumbs on your two ASIS. They could have the partner move their arms in different ways to demonstrate how the scapula moves. A lot of this would be review of Immersion Anatomy, so maybe not much is lost by doing it online.
• One activity that often happens with this module is the E-CAT working with an individual student to demonstrate what they are teaching, and then the others pair up and work with each other. For this activity (and similar ones that we will see in modules like Observation and Adjustments), it would be very helpful if E-CAT and students could have a family member or friend present with them to act as their student, so that they have someone to work on. As always, with the breakout rooms, the E-CAT can visit one room after another to observe and make suggestions.

Advanced Sequencing Module (12 hours minimum)

This module could be done online, although it might require more homework to really do it justice.

Suggested Activities:

• The main activities in this module are:
  • Presentation of information, which can be done via Zoom
  • Practice in creating sequences
  • Perhaps some group activities in creating sequences
• An additional activity could be homework to put together sequences, teach them, and report on it to the E-CAT. As a part of this, students love to receive each other’s sequences, so again, a Co-Mentoring type of situation where they observe each other teach and give feedback could be a very good follow-up activity, but we are not giving credit for non-contact hours.

Methodology and Co-Mentoring

This module has two parts, 12 contact hours and 12 non-contact hours. 

• The 12 contact hours happen first. This workshop has two intentions. The first is to go over a few elements of the teaching method that are not covered in other modules, such as demonstration and various skills under the label “instructions”. The second element of this workshop is to go over the principles about how to give and receive feedback, how to be a mentor or a mentee, in order to prepare the students to do this during the noncontact hours.
• The noncontact hours occur after the 12 contact hours happen. One thing that happens during the contact hours is that the students create groups of two or more, and then for the noncontact hours, they will see each other’s class and give feedback. 

Activities during the contact hours workshop:

• To teach about elements of the teaching method, such as demonstration or why and how to “link” instructions like Inner Spiral and Outer Spiral, the E-CAT might:
  • Give a mini-lecture, referring to what the Teacher Training Manual says about it.
  • Demonstrate teaching points regarding it.
  • Ask the students to practice teaching it, in small groups or teaching the entire group. Because of lack of time, this would probably happen in pairs or very small groups, so Zoom breakout rooms would work, much like with practice teaching asana in other modules.
• Activities related to the principles for mentors and mentees:
  • The E-CAT can present this just like the elements of the method are presented. The E-CAT can give mini-lectures about the two roles, and refer to the Student Handout, using ‘share screen’.
  • Then as the students pair up to practice teaching elements of the method, they will also practice being mentor or mentee. 

Like other modules that are about teaching asana in the Anusara style, practice teaching will be a challenge when done through an online platform. It can be done, but it is not optimal. 

Teaching with the UPAs Module (12 hours minimum)

The Main Activities in this module would be doing asanas, under the E-CATs guidance, to fully understand and assimilate the UPAs, and then practice teaching them yourself. Because of that, this would be one of the more challenging modules to do online. 

Some activities that we could do online, or how to do the main activities described above:

• Lecture/discussion about the UPAs, about cueing the UPAs, and other aspects of teaching the UPAs can be done online
• Asana practice can be done online with these suggestions: 
  • Observation of the students’ performance of the asana and the UPAs can best be done in ‘gallery’ view. 
  • The E-CAT can designate one student who is very familiar with the E-CAT’s teaching to demonstrate the asanas.  The students can use ‘speaker’ view and ‘pin’ that person’s image to their screen so that they see this person performing the actions, while the E-CAT sees all the students in gallery view and call out verbal adjustments.
• Practice teaching what they are learning can be done in breakout groups.

Observation and Adjustments

Observation and Adjustments is a very important teaching skill in Anusara Yoga, and probably the most difficult one to demonstrate and practice teaching when we are not together in one room. A main suggestion is that the teacher have a volunteer student with him or her, to demonstrate observation, verbal adjustments and physical adjustments, and that each student have someone with them to be their ‘student’ to practice observation and adjustments on them. 

Luckily, anyone who takes this module has probably already taken a 100-Hour Anusara Teacher Training, in which they were introduced to all the main ideas and skills in Observation and Adjustments. For example, hopefully they are very experienced now in simply talking students into the foundation and form of the Level 1 poses, and then pausing to observe and offer verbal adjustments.

Also, in the 100-Hour Teacher Training, they would have been introduced to the basic principles of physical adjustments, and some basic ones, such the ones listed at the end of the Teacher Training Manual.

Possible activities:

• If the E-CAT is teaching live classes, they can record a session with Zoom, and in that particular session, emphasize the subject of the module. In this case, it could be Observation and Verbal Adjustments or Observation and Physical Adjustments. They could send this to the students well before the live module occurs and require viewing, and perhaps a report, based on a short list of questions or topics to look for. For example, look at the general foundation and form of the poses the first 20 minutes, and then in the standing poses, this plus spirals, that sort of thing. Or look at these five physical adjustments, and in class, we will discuss what I saw and why that adjustment worked or did not. Since the students cannot see this done so well during the online session, this would help if they can see you do it in a recorded live session.
• If the E-CAT has the time and energy, after the module is completed, for homework, the students can record a class and send it to you for your feedback.
• At the beginning of the module, as a review, the E-CAT can remind the students about the basics of talking students into poses, cueing a bit of the UPAs, all the while observing and offering verbal adjustments, and demonstrate doing that on Zoom, either with one or two live students who are with the teacher, or a small group in gallery view, the others observing what you are observing. Then the students can go into breakout groups and each one teaches a few poses, observing and adjusting, with the teacher trainer going from group to group to observe. 
• The skill of giving an instruction and observing to see if students actually did it before going on to the next instruction is quite advanced. Many teachers are on a type of “automatic pilot”, rattling off a series of instructions without paying attention to whether the students are doing it. The E-CAT can demonstrate doing this in a particular pose, and in breakout groups, each student does it. The one acting as students doing asanas can be “beginners”, creating common misalignments for the ‘teacher’ to observe and verbally adjust.
• Physical Adjustments – we have what we call the “air assist”, meaning use your hands to show how you would do an adjustment but not on a body, instead, in the air. This technique would work online, so the E-CAT can show a pose on the screen, either live or a photo, and maybe have a photo of a misaligned one or one lacking a certain action, and do an air assist, and then in breakout rooms or if the students have live partners at home, they can practice either the “air assist” or do it on a partner at home.

Therapeutic Applications

This new module is an elective in the Anusara 300-Hour Teacher Training curriculum. There is a 100-page guide for teachers that the E-CAT can order for each of their students to use. The guide has 5 sections. 

• The first two sections are a review of the elements of the practice of Anusara Yoga and a fascinating overview of human anatomy, both with an eye toward therapeutic applications. All of this can be presented as mini-lecture/discussions using screen share on Zoom.
• The third section is about optimal and suboptimal patterning in the human body and stress, which is the source of therapeutic needs in yoga, in addition to impact injuries. This also could be covered with mini-lecture/discussions using screen share.
• Part four is about Therapeutic Observation, Teaching and Adjustments. Some of this is review of other modules or the 100-Hour Teacher Training. 
  • A common activity: the E-CAT observes a student, usually in an informal Tadasana, and shares what they see, then students would pair up and observe each other. Then they teach the UPAs to get the person into alignment, which will be the main element of the therapeutic applications of Anusara Yoga.
• The final part is the one that E-CATs and students will want to spend the most time on, and that is called “Therapeutic Applications”. It is divided into 9 sections about 9 areas of the body, such as the “lower back” or the “shoulders”. Each section includes lists of common conditions, observation hints regarding that section of the body, and a “toolbox”, that is a list of suggested asanas or other exercises that you might teach for the common conditions found in this section of the body. Some suggestions about teaching this last section:
  • Observing an area of the body – see part four above, but in this case, the E-CAT may be more directive and precise.
  • There will be mini-lecture/discussion time about the anatomy of that area, the common therapeutic issues, key UPAs, and contraindications.
  • The E-CAT will need to demonstrate some of the poses or exercises in the toolbox, to be clear about what is intended.
  • A key skill will be physical adjustments. The E-CAT can see ideas about how to do that in the Observation and Adjustments section.
  • Related to the exercises in the toolbox, is to explain what the intention or benefit of each one is to the repatterning or education of how we move that area of the body.