Yoga for Vocabulary and Linguistic Concepts 103Shape is another conceptual-linguistic domain that could
be incorporated into children’s yoga practice. Triangle pose is
named for the shape made by the arms and legs while in this
pose. Wenig (2003) describes two seated adaptations of this pose
that children practice with partners and a third standing version
that is practiced individually. In downward facing dog pose, the
children’s straightened arms and legs form an inverted letter
“V” or triangle shape. In conjunction with the opening line of a
preschool level adaptation of sun salutation (Bersma and Visscher
2003), which begins “I make a circle nice and round,” children
form a circle with their arms. A subsequent refrain of this sun
salutation states that “Now I am a triangle with my bottom on
the top,” which includes spatial/positional terms in addition
to the name of the shape.
The comparative and superlative adjective suffixes “-er” and
“-est” could be applied to many of the attributes listed in the
table. For example, children can be instructed to vigorously rub
their hands together “fast” and then “faster,” so that when they
subsequently place their opened palms over their eyes as part of
a relaxation exercise, they feel “warm” or perhaps “warmer” than
they did before. Similarly, children could be instructed to conduct
particular actions associated with a yoga pose through songs
such as Laurie Berkner’s “The Airplane Song” or Karma Kids
Yoga’s “Tic-Toc, Little Yoga Clock” by moving faster or slower,
and then the fastest or slowest. Exposure to these derivational
morphemes enhances both the depth and breadth of children’s
lexical knowledge as they hear new words based on root words
such as “fast” and “slow” from which they originated.
At the beginning or conclusion of many children’s yoga
sessions, a Namaste song is sung as an acknowledgement of
respect to the other participants in the group. “Namaste” is a
Sanskrit greeting that means “I honor the light in you” (Williams
2010). Adaptations of this salutation in children’s songs include