Before Martha became a full-time yoga teacher, she was a secondary school teacher. She lived in London for six years before moving to Devon, and has taught yoga and meditation in schools in both London and Devon. Through her specialist teen yoga organisation Yoga4Youth she offers individually tailored courses in yoga and meditation techniques for schoolchildren. She also runs courses for adults about teaching yoga and meditation to teenagers.

It is becoming increasingly evident that children’s well-being is based on a variety of different factors, and tools to deal with this often turbulent time of life are key to success.

Yoga4Youth works to provide yoga and meditation classes and workshops for teenagers. Delivering a variety of programmes, it can work within the school environment or in the community to teach young people skills to deal with the ever-increasing emotional and physical demands of growing up in the 21st century.

The vision is to teach simple yoga and meditation techniques to young people which can help them to lead more happy, healthy and complete lives. Some of the benefits of yoga and meditation include:

• A foundation for general well-being
• Controlled breathing helps to facilitate the ability to calm oneself when stressful situations occur
• Physical activity allows one to work out anger in a positive manner, transferring that energy into a positive result of health and well-being
• Helps to develop strong and healthy bones
• Strengthens the nervous and immune systems
• Fosters creativity and imagination
• Increases focus and attention span
• Helps individuals discover self-awareness and respect for others
• Fosters confidence and self-esteem
• Fosters the ability to communicate and improves social skills

Together with Gur Suraj Singh, Martha offers weekend workshops about teaching yoga and meditation to teenagers. The workshops cover the following areas:

• Teenage years from a yogic point of view
• Remembering how it felt to be a teenager
• Teen psychology and hormones
• Rituals, games, and dances for teens
• Kriya, meditation and mantra for teenagers
• Where and when we can teach teenagers
• How to teach a class for teenagers
• How to approach difficult teenagers – non-aggressive communication

This programme amounts to 20 hrs of study and can contribute to your CDP.

Gur Suraj Singh lives and works in South Germany. He is a level I teacher trainer of kundalini yoga and works with Amrit Nam Sarovar. Before embarking on his journey with yoga he was a social worker. He has over 35 years of experience of working with pre-teens/teens and young adults. He specialises in sexual education and child protection. He is also an outdoor expeditions guide and has been in charge of running the teen program at the Kundalini Yoga Festival in France for the past seven years.

Gur Suraj and Martha have been working together for the last six years providing a framework for teaching kundalini yoga specifically for teenagers. They work together at the Kundalini Yoga Festival and currently run a European Teen Programme which offers teens a week of experiential activities woven into kundalini yoga teachings.