Find A Grounded Kids Yoga Teacher
Welcome to our Grounded Kids Teacher Directory
All listed teachers have completed at least Step 1 – Get Grounded In Children’s Yoga and are qualified to skillfully teach using our methodology. Those with the distinction of Certified Grounded Kids Teacher have complete 95 hours of comprehensive training to earn their certification. Use Categories for this selection. In the Search bar, find a teacher by entering any of the following fields.:
- You are searching for the keyword(s): mary-beth-bender
Elisha Simpson
Biography
Elisha is the founder of laughing heart yoga, yogi, wife, mother of two children with a mission to guide kids to empower themselves from within. Elisha’s innate ability to connect with students of all ages and backgrounds stems from her creative, exhilarating and sensitive style of yoga – she makes yoga approachable and accessible. She focuses on building confidence in a loving & safe environment that accepts their challenges and encourages exploration of inner wisdom and strength.
Working at summer camp with at-risk youth in Texas at Promises for Families, compelled her to continue to do more with this population. Moving to New York, she sought additional opportunities to continue working with at-risk youth and began volunteering at Children’s Village in Dobbs Ferry, NY. She worked in a Rapid Intervention Center (RIC), a 21-day residential mental health crisis intervention program for boys and girls aged 5 to 17 years who experience acute behavioral or emotional problems that place them or others at risk.
Currently, Elisha is expanding laughing heart yoga to include the Art of Yoga Project’s (AYP) yoga and art-based curriculum to help girls recover from trauma. Participants in this program, named The Crossover Yoga Project, will benefit from AYP’s evidence-based curriculum by gaining self-regulation, self-control and self-awareness. Girls are led to be more accountable for themselves, for others, and for their community by gaining insight, skills, and practical tools that help them change their negative behavior to positive.
Elisha’s personal yoga practice of over 20 years has provided her the strength, knowledge and drive to commit to this work, as it has grounded her throughout her life. Attending college, living in Paris, working as a grant writer and fundraiser in the Florida art scene in the late 1990s, obtaining her Master’s from the University of Arizona in African Art History, and raising a family.
Elisha is a RCYT, (Registered Children’s Yoga Teacher) and RYT-200, (Registered Yoga Teacher, 200hour) with Yoga Alliance. She began teaching in 2000, after her yoga training with Darren Rhodes, John Friend, and Noah Maze of the former Anusara Yoga tradition. Inspired by the heart opening focus of this training, she developed a healing and receptive teaching style. Her original teaching style developed from her variety of certification programs including Hatha & Prenatal yoga, and training with top teachers in children’s yoga: Mary Lynn Fitton/Art of Yoga Project, Marsha Wenig/YogaKids, Jennifer Cohen Harper /Little Flower Yoga, Street Yoga. Additionally, she is a Master Level Certified Storytime Yoga Instructor with Sydney Solis of Storytime Yoga and continues her studies with Erin O’Malley of Circus Yogaand Cheryl Crawford of Grounded. Her teaching experience also includes working with Hope’s Door’s youth programs, and she initiated the yoga/health program at Open Door Medical Center for the prenatal, HIV and diabetes populations.
Her ambition is to always be a student and a teacher. Her inner child is always present, ready to play, laugh, connect, breath and empower her students. She has a beautiful daughter, adorable yet ironic son and loving husband that provide her with inspiration, laughter, and love she brings naturally to her teaching.
Mary Hooks
Biography
I have over 20 years experience in education and have a passion for meeting the needs of the whole child. I am just beginning my journey in Grounded Kids Yoga and am engaging staff and students at my school in poses and practices to support mindfulness.
Mary Johnson
Mary Quinn Templeton
Biography
Mary Stoops
Mary McMahon
Mary De Risi
Mary O’Connor
Mary O’Connor
Mary Beth Bender
Biography
Mary Beth has always had a love for children. Ever since she was a small child, she knew that she wanted to be a teacher. She began babysitting at the age of 10 and her senior year in high school, she did her senior project in a 3rd/4th grade classroom. It was her intention to study Elementary Education in college, but life had other plans for her and she studied Creative Writing & Fine Arts. In 1995 her father passed away suddenly and through her process of deep grief and sadness, she discovered yoga. It was when she discovered yoga that she was reminded of her childhood and the contemplative moments that she often experienced outside under trees or through laying on the grass and looking up at the sky. She was able to rediscover her sense of ahh and wonder, which then reminded her of how much she loved and adored children. Mary Beth also grew up with ADD/ADHD and multiple learning disabilities. She took Ritalin, which eventually lead her to struggle with her body and the emotions that she felt around being diagnosed as learning disabled. She found that yoga helped her to focus, which eventually lead her to stop Ritalin.
She has always felt that her story about the struggles she went through as a child in school would someday inspire education to shift. Mary Beth used to substitute teach in both the Montessori and Public school classroom. Her experiences with children taught her that teaching young kids was part of her purpose.
In 2005, Mary Beth was working at Kripalu Yoga Center when one day she overheard 2 of her co-workers talking about a kids yoga class that they were leading that day. She became very curious and started asking a lot of questions, which then lead her to researching a program where she could become a certified kids yoga teacher. At that same time, Mary Beth already had experience teaching yoga to adults, but knew that she really wanted to be teaching yoga to children. In that same year, she flew to Los Angelos for a training/certification with Yoga Kids International. She then began teaching yoga to children at a day care and a small studio in New Hampshire. In 2006 Mary Beth moved to Charlotte, NC where she eventually began teaching yoga to children all over the city. She has taught hundreds of classes in various environments such as community centers, a church, studios, schools, a gym, a toy store and even a grocery store!
Mary Beth is a 500 hr RYT with an additional 95 hour Children’s Yoga teacher certification. She is pursuing another 95 hours with Grounded Yoga. She has studied with Yoga Kids International, Asheville Yoga Center, Little Flower Yoga and Grounded Kids Yoga and continues to see inspiration in the work of others.
Mary Beth is a child at heart and has an infectious love and warmth for children. Children enjoy her boundless energy and her youthful spirit.