Author: Polly

Date: October 11, 2024

Category: News,Reports

Reading time: 2.9 mins

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Author: Polly

Date: October 11, 2024

Category: News,Reports

Reading time: 2.9 mins

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Yoga and Learning Disabilities: Exploring the Therapeutic Connection

Want to teach those with Learning Disabilities (LD)?

Discover how yoga is perfectly suited to supporting the unique needs of people with LD — and why specialised training is crucial for creating a truly inclusive, empowering environment.

By Ellie Firth

We’re all familiar with yoga’s mental and physical benefits, but for the 1.5 million people in the UK with LD, yoga unlocks deeper possibilities for movement, breathwork, connection, and self-expression. When teachers learn to tailor their approach, the impact on the LD community can be profound — yoga not only improves physical health but also fosters a sense of belonging, emotional resilience, and joy.

Why yoga for those with LD?

Those with LD face a range of health challenges that yoga is uniquely equipped to address. The flexibility of yoga makes it accessible to all abilities, and its benefits extend beyond the mat to enhance quality of life:

Mental Health: People with LD are twice as likely to suffer from mental health problems as the rest of the population. Yoga nurtures body awareness and emotional recognition, offering tools for self-regulation. For individuals with LD, this heightened awareness can prevent mental health issues from escalating, leading to greater emotional stability.

Sensory Processing: Many people with LD struggle with sensory sensitivities. Yoga helps focus attention on bodily sensations, promoting acceptance and learning to process or ignore overwhelming stimuli—key for managing stress and improving concentration.

Physical Well-being: Yoga builds strength, improves balance, and enhances proprioception, all of which are essential for preventing falls. It also promotes healthy body weight and mobility, tackling the common issues of obesity and sedentary behaviour.

Breathing and Sleep: Yoga’s focus on breathwork strengthens the respiratory system and reduces mouth breathing, while its calming effects promote better sleep, addressing common sleep disturbances in the LD population.

Why specialised training matters

Adapting yoga for individuals with LD requires more than basic knowledge—it calls for specialised skills to ensure accessibility, safety, and effectiveness. With tailored training, teachers learn to modify poses, simplify instructions, and use non-verbal communication, making the practice inclusive and engaging for all participants. Specialised training equips instructors to handle common LD-related challenges like respiratory difficulties, poor mental health, and sensory issues.

By gaining these skills, yoga teachers can build person-centred sessions that empower individuals with LD to experience the full benefits of yoga, improving their physical health, mental well-being, and social connections.

In a broader sense, people with LD have unique ways of seeing and experiencing the world. Teaching yoga to LD groups (yoga itself being infinitely adaptable and requiring only breath as a non-negotiable) opens up the practice in extraordinary, unexpected and beautiful ways – in movement, non-verbal communication and interpersonal connections. It is uplifting for participants, carers and teachers alike. To us, it is absolutely clear that including people with LD in our classes benefits everyone.

Training with Umbrella Yoga CIC

Umbrella Yoga CIC is at the forefront of inclusive yoga, delivering over 100 sessions a month, with around 40 of those specific to LD groups. Our evidence-based training equips yoga instructors with the tools to make yoga accessible to everyone, emphasising inclusivity and community-building.

Join us to help create a world where everyone, regardless of ability, can experience the life-enhancing benefits of yoga.

Ellie Firth is the founder and a director of Umbrella Yoga CIC.

For more information visit us at: umbrellayoga.co.uk

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