Tai Chi for health & wellbeing
The Good
I had a very enjoyable day last week running our Pozitive Kidz are happy kidz workshops for grade 3-6 students at Montmorency South Primary School.
It would have to be one of the friendliest schools I have been to in my ten years delivering student workshops and programs for primary and secondary schools. The organiser, Mandy, was very professional and the office staff, principal and teachers made me feel very welcomed.
Here’s the feedback I received after running the workshops:
I’m having fun, as usual, running our Pozitive Kidz are happy kidz six week program. The focus is on building self esteem from a Tai Chi perspective.
The kids love the speedy Tai Chi drill. This is where I stand out in front of about 30-40 students and yell out various posture names and then they have to quickly jump into position.
For example I’ll yell out names such as;
Well, I’m ready to launch my new Pozitive Kidz are Succesful Kidz program for primary schools here in Melbourne, Australia.
The flyer is completed and the next step is to contact schools for an expression of interest, which I’ll do next week.
This 6 week program is designed for grade 5 and grade 6 students to help them become the best they can be in both their academic studies and their relationships with others. I use both Appreciative Intelligence and Kinaesthetic Intelligence concepts and activities.
I was in contact with a student wellbeing teacher at a secondary school recently regarding our conneXions (Y9), Top Tens (Y10), and Success and Resilience (VCE) workshops. We discussed the possibility of running workshops with all her Year 10 students.
She wanted to know if I could run a workshop with a large number of students, as it would be cost effective because of their limited budget.
It was tempting, but I explained to her that I no longer run workshops for large groups of students at secondary schools because I don’t think they are effective when compared with working with a small group. Particularly when it involves a very interactive physical art such as Tai Chi.
I was in Hobart, Tasmania, last week working with primary school students in our ‘Pozitive Kidz are happy kidz’ workshops.
It’s a program I’ve run for years and it focuses on building self esteem from a Tai Chi perspective.
In one of the workshops I discovered the ‘one Tai Chi second’.
It was after our yin meditative exercise which was preceded by a very active yang exercise.
I was reinforcing the theme that we need to pause before we react to things without thinking.
And it occurred to me to use the term ‘one Tai Chi second’. It’s something that I’ve never used before and it was created on the spot. And these creative moments are always a delight because it gives me more material to use when teaching young students.
I said to the students, ‘if you feel upset, or someone is teasing you, slowly breathe for one Tai Chi second’.
How long is one Tai Chi second?
As long as it takes to remain calm and centred.