CHILDREN’S STUDY

Tara is a philosopher of a multifaceted approach to working with and just BEING with children. She has a strong foundation in child psychology and teaching public school education as she obtained her B.A. in Early Childhood Education (nursery-grade 3) from Simmons College in 1991. While in college, Tara studied the educational philosophies of Plato, Rousseau, Dewey and varied approaches to educating the human spirit. She became a certified Montessori Teacher (pre-primary-kindergarten) in 1992 and was a dedicated classroom teacher of the method not only to children, but classroom assistants and parents for over 7 years. Montessori education, like yoga is about a way of being, which she carries into the fabric of her everyday experience both with adults and children.

“The first essential is that the teacher should go through an inner, spiritual preparation-cultivate certain aptitudes in moral order. This is the most difficult part of her training, without which all the rest is of no avail…she must study how to purify her heart and render it burning with charity towards the child. She must ‘put on humility’ and, above all, learn how to serve. She must learn to appreciate and gather in all those tiny and delicate manifestations of opening to the child’s soul. Ability to do this can only be obtained through genuine effort towards self-perfection.”

- Maria Montessori-

Tara was introduced to Waldorf Education in 1997 while implementing her first children’s yoga program at a Waldorf inspired school, where she was also a classroom teacher from 1999-2001. Since then, she has been an active student of the Waldorf method. She completed the two- year Foundations Study Course in Waldorf Education in 2005 and as of 2009, holds a MA.Ed. in Waldorf Early Childhood (n-K) and Elementary Education (grades 1-8). She continues to explore the ways that Waldorf education informs the breadth and depth of discovering yoga as a way of life and learning for children.

In ancient times, in India, students would go to live with their teacher and the teacher’s family to work, study and practice selfless service. Family life and education were interrelated in the daily life of growing up. Children studied various aspects of yogic life, philosophy and knowledge. This epoch began on the child’s eighth birthday and lasted for the following 12 years. The teacher and the student had a very significant relationship. These systems today are very rare, however, both Montessori and Waldorf philosophy place high value around the unique bond that takes place between educator, student and parents when a child has the same teacher for any where between 3-8 years at a time. Not to mention, the impact it has on the sense of stability it gives the developmental progression of each individual child. Tara has been blessed with the good fortune of spending period of time living in the same area, working and studying not only with her own Instructors, but also being in relationship to her students and their families for extended periods of time.

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Below is a poem that was written to Tara by her Friday afternoon neighborhood yoga class that has met for the past eight years (I have left the spelling in its original script):

Written, May 2006

Tara is a yogi
A very good yogi is she
Yoga has been fun this year
And when it’s done our eyes will tear
We learned some new poses
And how to touch our towses!
We had some good foods for prasat
They helped us be healthy and smat

So thank you Tara for your wonderful gift
Through your teaching our lives will shift
Yes, thank you Tara for Fridays of fun
Yoga class with everyone!

Tara’s curiosity stems far beyond any one way of education. Movement and experiential learning are the basis for holistic physical, mental, emotional and spiritual evolution. This investigation is what led her to the School for Body Mind Centering, the founder Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen and Marcia Monroe, BMC practitioner and children’s yoga educator, in the year 2000. There, she came into an experiential approach to rediscovering the evolution of human movement patterns and examining the question: “What is an informed meaningful Hatha Yoga practice for children?”

Tara has work professionally with children since 1989. Her love of yoga is expressed through the above philosophies, her continuous study of the budding human being and her deep reverence for the child. She has developed her own approach to children’s yoga; which is simply, yet uniquely a synthesis of education, developmental and authentic movement and yogic teachings; and has been teaching yoga to young people from ages nursery through high school since 1997.

She has been Coordinator, Director and Instructor of a Family Yoga Program at the Sivananda Yoga Ranch since 1997. Since 2003, Tara (Omkari) has Coordinated, Directed and Taught a Teen Yoga Camp Program at the Sivananda Yoga Ranch. She has been leading The Family Yoga Vacation at The Sivananda Yoga Ashram Retreat on Paradise Island, Bahamas for two years.
(www.sivanandayoga.org)

Family Week

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Teen Week

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Tara instructs classes in public schools, private schools, after school programs, yoga centers, family neighborhoods and privately.

Tara has been teaching yoga to adults, children, teens and families in the Boston area since 1997.

For Private, group or individual instruction and workshops

Contact Tara : omrachel@hotmail.com

 

In The Media
Montgomery County Public Television, Maryland Show: Model for The Twenty Minute Yogi “ Power Yoga” “ Yoga with the Stability Ball”	Spring 1993
Model for Fit Magazine, 8 Day Yoga Detox Plan, Baptiste Power Yoga	April 2000
Boston Globe Article, The Art of Teaching Yoga to Children	February 2001
Interviewed by NPR News for Children’s Yoga	March 2001
Fox Channel 5: Children’s Yoga Evening news The 4:30p.m. Show	April 2001 May 2001
Model for Body Wisdom Media DVD: Yoga for Inflexible People	May 2002
Model for Prana Catalog	Spring 2003
(click to enlarge) photo © Clark Quinn, clothing by Prana photo © Clark Quinn, clothing by Prana
Boston PBS Children’s Televison: Fetch! “Relaxin with Ruff”	Summer 2006
Presentations
Thompson Elementary School, Arlington, Ma. Introduced Yoga 2 sessions to the three, first grade classes.	2008, 2009
Trauma Sensitive Yoga Training Introduced strategies for sharing yoga with Families that is structured to meet both the issues for the parent and the child individually and collectively.	Nov. 2008, May, 2009
Bowman Elementary School, Lexington Ma. Taught yoga classes for the student body, grades 1-5, two 30 minutes classes for one week during their scheduled gym period.	January 2008
The Franklin Park Zoo, Boston, Ma. Taught family yoga classes at the zoo as a guest presenter for the Jane Goodall Institute for Earth Day	March 2006
The Hastings School, Lexington, Ma. Taught yoga classes for the student body (500 children): Grades: kindergarten through fifth grade. Two 30 minute classes per class, for one week during their scheduled gym period. The week concluded with a group presentation at the all school assembly.	June 2006
The Cary Memorial Library, Lexington, Ma. Taught yoga classes for preschoolers, children and teens for their presentation day: “The Mind-Body Connection.”	Nov. 2006
The Yoga Studio, Boston, Ma. Yoga and the Meridians: Qi Flow for the teacher’s training course.	May 2003
Sivananda Yoga Ashram, N.Y.: Teaching Yoga to Children	Oct.2006 Oct. 2002 Sept.1997
Peace Education in a Montessori Classroom Course to implement peace education for children in the pre-primary class for teachers in training.	June 1997
Barbara Kemp Award for Excellence in Student Teaching Simmons College, Boston, Ma.	Spring 1991
I would like to dedicate my work to my dear teacher and my inspiration, Sarabess Forster, of The Sunflower Yoga Company, a pioneer of yoga for children. I would also like to dedicate my practice to all the teachers who have walked this earth ahead of me. Those who offered seeds of wisdom for those of us on this path, to find and sow, in order that we may grow to serve the development of the child and ultimately the future consciousness of humanity.