Student Safety: Promote Student Safety: Beginners: Student Safety

An international survey of 33,000 yoga teachers, therapists, and other clinicians from 35 countries published in 2009 found that respondents most commonly blamed these five reasons for yoga injuries:

1. Excessive student effort (81%)
2. Inadequate teacher training (68%)
3. More people doing yoga overall (65%)
4. Unknown pre-existing conditions (60%)
5. Larger classes (47%)

Source: Angela Pirisi

Injury prevention is accomplished through promoting student safety in practice.

• To promote student safety involves such tasks as fostering a noncompetitive environment, teaching students to take responsibility for themselves, and referring students with particular conditions to an expert. For more on this topic, see Art of Teaching: Promoting Student Safety.
• Of course, properly teaching pose alignment and accommodations, and appropriate breath practices, is fundamental to keeping students safe. To help you in these areas, we go deep on teaching support for each pose and breath practice. See the Study Library for an organized way to delve into these topics.

See more: About Injuries & Conditions in Yoga