How to Teach the Pigeon Pose

With jobs that require hours of desk work, which keep your hips from extending, flexing and rotating, it’s no wonder your hips become stuck and stiff. Yoga is an excellent way to unstick your hips and maintain your flexibility. Teaching the Pigeon -- part of a family of yoga poses sometimes referred to as hip-openers -- can help your students avoid tight hips. This pose helps increase the outward rotation of the hip joint while lengthening the psoas, a major hip flexor muscle that can become shortened with hours of sitting.

Things You'll Need

  • Yoga mat
  • Yoga blanket
  • Yoga block
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Instructions

    • 1

      Lead your students through several gentle warm-up poses. Include poses such as the Child's pose, Mountain pose, Upward Salute or the Standing Forward Bend. These poses will help your students quiet their minds and prepare their bodies. Instruct them to only go as far as they comfortably can in each pose.

    • 2

      Have everyone get on their hands and knees to move into the Pigeon pose. Check to see that their hands are below their shoulders and their knees are below their hips.

    • 3

      Instruct your students to slowly move their right knee up to the back of their right hand and then swing their lower leg around toward the left until their right foot is just behind their left hand. For students who aren't that flexible, tell them to keep their foot farther back from their left hand and, if necessary, move their heel back until it touches their left hip crease. Remind them to keep their right foot flexed.

    • 4

      Tell your students to now extend their left leg backward, point their toes toward the back of the room and lower their hips toward the mat. Check to see that their hips are level and square to the front of the room. If any of your students are finding it hard to keep their hips level, place a blanket or a block under their right hip.

    • 5

      Ask everyone to now walk their hands backward, push their fingertips into the mat and lift their torso to lengthen their back. Remind your students to press their tailbone down and forward and to keep their head and chest up during this movement.

    • 6

      Instruct your students to now inhale and then walk their hands forward while they exhale and lower their torso toward the mat as far as they comfortably can. Have them support themselves on their forearms. For students who are extremely flexible, have them extend their arms in front of their right shin, lay their torso across their right shin and place their forehead on a block or the mat.

    • 7

      Have your students hold the position and to breath slowly, in and out through their nose. After 60 seconds, instruct everyone to push through their hands, lift their hips, return to the on-all-fours position and repeat with their left leg forward.