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After Gina Ghighi read about some of the benefits of yoga, she decided to bring it to her special education life skills classroom at John F. Kennedy Elementary School in Spring Valley.
“I found so many different things it affects,” Ghighi said of yoga, an ancient practice utilizing the flow of one’s breath to hold poses for strength, balance and stress relief.
She read that yoga improves listening skills, calms participants down, helps with physical balance and can reduce symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, known as ADHD. She thought her 11 students, from second to eighth grade with “a wide range of physical and cognitive disabilities,” would benefit.
Ghighi asked Karry Kurtz, instructor and owner at Yoga for Life in Peru, to come in every other Monday to teach beginning yoga to the students.
“I can see it,” Ghighi said about the results. “I can see their calmness.”
Rachel Stella can be reached at (815) 220-6933 or svreporter@newstrib.com. Follow her on Twitter @NT_SpringValley.