Instructions
- Close your eyes and picture a balloon in your lap slowly growing bigger, as you breathe in through your nose.
- Picture it getting smaller as you breathe out through your nose and release all your tummy air. Breathe in, fill your balloon, and let your arms rise away from you to encircle the balloon.
- Now gently press your balloon flat, letting your arms come back in towards your belly.
- Repeat several times.
Note for Parents
This pose can be done at a desk or sitting on the floor.
Activity Ideas for Home or Classroom
Awesome Anatomy
Give each student a balloon to inflate. Let them blow it up and then let the air flow back out, observing the shape of the balloon. The balloon shrinks because of the elasticity of the material. Students can learn that their lungs are also elastic: they inflate with an inhalation and will deflate on their own, with no muscular effort. Students will also be interested to learn that the lungs do not have muscles at all; we inhale by expanding the ribs and/or flattening the diaphragm muscle. The lungs are held against the inside of the chest wall by a vacuum.
Body Benefits
Breathing deeply and fully with Balloon Breath brings more oxygen into our blood stream to make us more alert and focused.
Math Medley
Play with a 2 to 1 ratio as a pattern to increase your breathing capacity. For example, breathe in for 2 counts, and breathe out for 4 counts. Gradually let your breath and number power expand.