Barefoot Body's Unique Approach to Yoga Teacher Training
Barefoot Body’s unique and accredited entry-level teaching qualification takes an embodied approach to yoga practices and philosophy, weaves trauma-sensitivity throughout, and nurtures your personal enrichment as well as your professional development.
This post was originally featured on the Barefoot Body Blog written by Beverley Nolan.
Embodied, trauma-sensitive, and inclusive with small groups, generous financial assistance, and above industry standard graduate support, our yoga teacher trainings are unique.
On our teacher trainings, we aim to help you discover your own unique style through embodied learning, and to ensure you acquire the knowledge, skills and confidence you need to share your preferred style of yoga in a safe, accessible manner with the communities that matter to you.
We know that our approach is unique. Here's how…
Our Embodied Approach
Taking learning off the page and into your own felt-experience.
We take an embodied approach across the whole discipline of yoga. We apply it to anatomy, asana, pranayama, philosophy and even ethics because we believe that experiential study is the most effective way to integrate learning experiences.
Embodied practices involve your whole being: 'head-heart-hands'. It's about taking learning off the page, interacting with information beyond the cognitive level and bringing it into the felt experience.
So each individual who participates in a learning encounter with us is held as a holistic being, as someone who has capacity for thinking, feeling and acting. This enables you to take what you have discovered off the mat, out of the training, and into your life at large.
By teaching and learning in an embodied way, we empower you and your future students to use your own experiences as a means of defining your yoga practice. It's a co-creative process that's non-hierarchical, inclusive and accessible.
Exceptional Tutors
Learn from experts in their fields who think outside the box.
Our faculty comprises a core team of highly experienced teachers committed to bringing the very best of themselves to the training room. They have been working and studying together for more than 10 years and are passionate about their own particular fields of interest.
You will also meet Guest Tutors, friends of Barefoot Body, who bring to you specialist and current scholarship in the fields of Yoga History, Culture & Philosophy, and engage you in conversations on contemporary themes and practical, professional Ethics.
In addition, you will have access to two world renowned yoga anatomy tutors for our online anatomy course - Amy Matthews and Leslie Kaminoff.
Small Groups
A more personal, tailored training with limited numbers.
Many teacher training providers have around 30 trainees in their cohorts but we prefer to keep things small, with a maximum of 16 people at any one time.
We limit places because we believe that face-to-face teaching in small groups means everyone participates in co-creating a dynamic for a fully embodied learning experience, breathing new life into tried and trusted lesson plans and content every time.
There's a place for every voice in the room, knowledge and experience is shared, and respectful connections are forged. Small groups also allow us to offer you a deeper level of personal enrichment.
Trauma Sensitive
Teaching and learning that is sensitive towards the impact of your life experiences.
We understand that life impacts each of us in different ways. That's why everything we do is informed by an awareness of the potential impact your experiences might have made. We believe this is the most respectful and compassionate way to fully empower you and your students.
Inspired By Inclusivity
Open to all with support in creating your own Outreach Project.
We believe in yoga for all and for every body so if want to share what you love about the practice, then we’d like to help you get the skills and confidence to do this.
Our embodied, trauma-sensitive approach means that everyone can access our teaching, regardless of the forms we inhabit, the communities we come from, or the circumstances we experience. There are no pre-requisites about your ability to do complex forms/asana or to fit any pre-conceived image of what a yoga teacher looks like. We are all learning and creating our practice in our own way.
Ongoing Support After You Graduate
Teaching and business mentoring, outreach assistance, reunions and more in your first year as a yoga teacher.
Our support and enthusiasm doesn't stop with awarding our graduates a well-earned glossy certificate and wishing them luck at the end of their 200-Hour Yoga Teacher Training. We take a genuine interest in each of our trainees and our investment in their journey from student to teacher continues well after graduation.
With mentoring hours that continue during your first year of teaching, graduate discounts on further education, and reunion events, no other teacher training provider offers quite the same level of ongoing support that Barefoot Body provides when it comes to yoga teacher graduates.
Generous Financial Support
Bursaries and flexible payment plans.
We're committed to minimising financial barriers to learning, which is why we offer interest free payment plans to support you as well as an Early Bird booking period - don't miss it! View early bird offer >
We're also proud to offer not just two bursary places for each of our teacher trainings. So if you are on a low income or identify/work with underrepresented communities in yoga teaching you may very well be eligible for bursary support.
An Exploration of Somatics
Deepening your experience of yoga and movement.
We weave the thread of somatics in our trainings, using movement modalities beyond yoga as a method of exploration.
We believe that this enquiry-based practice encourages you to get curious about your own experience of the forms of yoga, and develop a new understanding about how your body meets them. In turn, you may begin to discover new ways to think, feel, move, and teach.
Somatics is the study of the self from the perspective of one’s lived experience, encompassing the dimensions of body, psyche, and spirit’ - Thomas Hanna
Personal Enrichment
On-to-one mentoring, peer networking and self-coaching techniques.
The path to becoming a yoga teacher is more than a professional journey in which you develop the knowledge and tools you need to teach yoga. It's also a deeply personal experience that can be very rewarding.
As well as dedicated hours towards one-to-one personal mentoring, our trainings are also enriched with peer networking and embodied self-coaching techniques that offer valuable tools not just for your teaching but your life as a whole.
No Essays or Written Exams
Assessments that capture your learning at its best.
We don't believe that long essays or written exams are a good indicator of the way you teach. That's why our assessments are carried out through a combination of online worksheets and written assignments related to class planning, self-practice, and understanding common Sanskrit terms.
We also ask you to design a 6 week beginners course to teach to friends, family or colleagues as well as take part in an observed practical assessment which takes the form of teaching a mini-class to your peers.
Did you know? Barefoot Body is our Teacher Training partner and we are thrilled that they have brought their unique offerings to CAMYOGA.
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Join the Ashtanga Mysore class this Saturday led by Tamara Ashley, in memory of R. Sharath Jois [the grandson of Ashtanga yoga’s founder, K. Pattabhi Jois], who passed away suddenly on Monday 11 November [2024]. We will dedicate the practice to Sharath, his family, friends and devoted students, and all beings' peace, happiness and health.