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Some more comments from past The Art of Teaching course registrants:

The Art Of Teaching Is Simply Beyond All Expectations

The Art of Teaching is simply beyond all expectations and the opportunity to be held in this way so as to be aided in embodying this pedagogic model is just so wonderful. . . What a peerless training this is.

Wendy Millyard

This Is Making Planning And Teaching More Satisfying For Me.

Thank you very much for the sessions this week which I enjoyed and found interesting and informative. I appreciate the time and care put into the preparation which in itself is modelling the art of teaching so I have been spending much more time in preparation and this is making planning and teaching more satisfying for me.

Charlotte HugginsYoga Teacher

My Students Are Receiving All The Benefits.

Thank you for everything! I find I cannot say that enough!! I am learning so much from the course and am finding that in spite of not teaching yoga (yet) I am able to put such a lot of the material into practice in my day-to-day teaching life - my students are receiving all the benefits.

Carolanne WeidleYoga Teacher

Once I Had Been Present In My First Webinar I Moved Heaven And Earth To Be In Attendance!

I found the course content to be transformative. It has provided me with countless opportunities for reflection, integration and renewal. It has made me think differently about myself not only as a yoga teacher, but as a human being! There have been so many beautiful opportunities throughout the course to pause, to consider, and to think carefully about interactions with others and myself.

The structure of the course was excellent. I found the mix of the experiential and theoretical classes, together with the manual and other resources provided, to really enhance the course content. Once I had been present in my first Webinar I moved heaven and earth to be in attendance! I found them to really shine through as a component of the course that helped bridge the tricky space between the warmth of an in-person training to an online format.
 
I also am thankful for the care taken for the administrative aspects of the course. Often overlooked, I feel previously this has drawn some attention away from content in other (particularly online) learning I have completed. Access, organisation and support was seamless, and the thought that has gone into troubleshooting and supporting students in their learning experience has not gone unnoticed.
Deborah SegalRYT200, High School Teacher

Extra Level Of Insight And Value Watching Donna Teach

In a course about the art of teaching, it's just fantastic being able to watch Donna teach and interact with real students in a Yoga class. It adds a whole extra level of insight and value. That said, it was also great to watch her approach to teaching an online class to camera on her own as this is something we all now find ourselves doing.

Thank you both for the care put into the delivery of the course.

Tiffany BownFounder of NurtureWorks Yoga and Qigong

It Is Very Evident That The Art Of Teaching Was Put Together With Thought

I have seen the ongoing trajectory of Donna's work that I was drawn to immediately 20 years ago due to her somatic approach and experience. It is very evident that The Art of Teaching was put together with thought, attention to detail and has set itself apart from the current reality  (deficit) of what is out there for yoga offerings/training/enrichments in this modern world. It has been a real gift to your current students and also to those who don't find themselves fitting into the cookie-cutter programs available.

Sharon Smith-CarterCCSE, RSME, RYT500

Validating, Challenging, Lovingly Supportive, Full Of Challenges

Please let me take this moment to tell you how heartening the entire course has been for this old girl, veteran teacher and devotee of inquiry-based learning.  The journey has been validating, challenging, lovingly supportive, full of challenges.
Please know that up here in the frozen north, there is at least one teacher who is warmed thoroughly by all you have done for me and for the teaching of yoga as I know it.
My world is more beautiful because of you.

Ruth Ann PennyMovement Educator and Yoga Instructor

These Classes Have Been Invaluable For Progressing Healing From A Very Old Knee Injury That I Have Been Enduring For 40 Years.

Donna, the classes you offer are exquisitely crafted, highly informative, and also leave a spaciousness that makes room for inner connection and self-inquiry.

These classes have been invaluable for progressing healing from a very old knee injury that I have been enduring for 40 years. I enjoy being able to integrate and explore the experiential class content into my home practice and also share some of the new skills with my students.

Srimukti RinkelSenior Yoga Teacher

I Am Thrilled, Perplexed, Inspired, And Heartened, Even Feel Vindicated, By This Deep Course.

I am thrilled, confounded, intrigued, perplexed, inspired, and heartened, even feel vindicated, by this deep course. Thank you very much for this chance to learn from you. The multiple angles you show us to get at teaching principles are really useful, like a big catalog for evolving our teaching.

Sansea SparlingYin Yoga Instructor

This Course Has Given Me A Clear Process And Framework For Even Further Refinement

I have gained so much from the course, and have particularly benefited from the idea of layering instructions to build a vocabulary and experiential layering of these enquiries.  The idea of ‘less is often more’ can be applied not only to a student’s practice, but to a teacher’s instruction! 

Although working with your enquiry approach for many years in both personal practice and my teaching, this course has given me a clear process and framework for even further refinement, for my learning, for teaching, and for my business structure. 

Lisa MorrisonIYTA, NZ Dip. Tchg. Founder Yoga4Life

The Art of Teaching Course Brings Me Back To More Clarity And Compassion

I am very grateful for this course, for the model that Donna presents as a teacher and for what this engenders within myself. It seems that every time I feel a bit off track, The Art of Teaching course brings me back to more clarity and compassion for both myself and all those in my life. 
 
Yoga has seemingly become part of a colonising paradigm, a culture of dominance over people, nature, animals and thought, extending into an internal kind of bullying of the body, mind and spirit. 
 
The Art of Teaching course has helped to renew my allegiance with the true yoga - of a continuum of possibility, really helping me to feel more wholeness and joy and to make that the focus of my teaching. 
Angela MainYoga Teacher

Rich In Content And Beautifully Paced

Just a quick note to say how much I have been enjoying the course so far, so rich in content and beautifully paced and delivered. I'm also enjoying Donna's sincere and honest sharing and sense of humour, love your view of the world!

Justine JonesYoga Teacher

New Ways To Engage Students To Actively Find Ways To Refine Their Interoception

As a beginner yoga student I was introduced to the very structured Iyengar Style and was always trying to emulate my teacher with no understanding that I couldn't be an exact copy of what I was observing, despite experiencing pain in certain asanas.  I remember my first introduction to Donna's teaching held in Ballina back in 2004 and I honestly want to thank her for taking yoga in a direction that allows everyone to feel safe and accepted for who they are and to listen and honour their capabilities in any given moment. Thank you for introducing me to new ways to engage students to actively find ways to refine their interoception of body and space.

Sandra McCuishLevel 3 Yoga Australia Member

Collation of snippets from Lois - Source for targeted testimonials

Insights about decision making to join the course:
 
After completing my yoga teacher training in 2003 I taught community classes for many years where students signed up for ten to twelve week terms. This was the way I had been taught yoga (in the 1990's, and I continued that tradition. I could get to know the students well, offer a developmental approach over the term and students could continue on into another term to deepen their experiential learning which many did. As a social worker I knew that for change to occur one needed to create a safe, supported environment in which to teach and to develop a constructive teacher/student relationship. This approach provided the conditions for this to occur. Specific workshops could be designed based on what was emerging from the classes.
In 2007 I stopped teaching for a while due to ill health and during the next few years yoga changed incredibly. Studios popped up everywhere and yoga increasingly became big business. I really felt I did not fit anymore. I continued to teach a class for staff at the refugee trauma counselling agency where I worked. 
In 2017, I began teaching a few classes at a small studio near where I lived. It was great to be offered the space and a lot of freedom to teach in the way I prefer, however, the restrictions of drop in classes, shorter class times ( I had been used to teaching 1 1/2 hour classes minimum), and not being able to lead the kind of culture in the studio that I would prefer were limiting. The CoVid 19 pandemic put an end to this work and has given me pause to review where my place is in the yoga teaching space.
 
My focus recently has been on developing a yoga program in the agency where I work part time, for people who have come to Australia as refugees and asylum seekers and who have complex psychological trauma. As a part of this I developed a training for staff who work with this community. The training includes, what yoga really is (using the sutras a base); anatomy and physiology relevant to the somatic response to trauma; cross cultural considerations; guidelines and protocols for teaching yoga in this context. The premise of the training is, if counselling, groupwork and community development workers are to facilitate and support access to yoga in this field, they need to have a good understanding of what yoga is and how it works, themselves. I had just completed the first half of this training and staff had responded really positively to it. I thought to myself, "I do have something to offer in the yoga teaching world! How might this develop? I went to have lunch and opened my emails to see 'The Art of Teaching' opportunity. My heart bet a little faster. What synchronicity! I have participated in many of Donna's workshops and read all her books. She never disappoints. Her philosophy about teaching aligns with my own. Her depth of understanding and study into the mindbody matrix offers what I have not found anywhere else and both affirms my own study and insights and takes me even further. Thus, I did not hesitate to sign up. To me the message was, "this is part of the journey and will lead somewhere even if it is not clear at the present moment what that might look like. It really was a moment of feeling the next step on my dharma path manifesting. This has borne out to be true!
 
At this stage in the course, about half way through, what I am sitting with is:
    a deeper and more supported conviction to only teach in ways that are congruent with this model of teaching;
    that this may mean a one on one approach incorporated into my psychotherapy practice, though I am carefully holding off jumping to any conclusions at this stage to give space for the unknown to emerge;
    that I first need to replenish deeply and dig deeper into my own psyche-soma experience through Donna's teaching before I make any decisions.
Lois WhitemanPsychotherapist and yoga teacher

I love Donna’s books and have been wanting for years to attend her trainings but was never able to in person.. this course was an amazing opportunity to get live access to Donna’s teachings without travel. And I was feeling disillusioned by the current Yoga climate/ commercialisation/ manipulation/ guru mentality and I LOVE how Donna doesn’t stand for any of that! I had stopped teaching but now with my new embodied knowledge from this course so far, I’m excited to start teaching again. 

I just want to say how incredibly valuable this course has been for my personal and professional life. The content is obviously amazing (thanks Donna!), but the course structure, the presentation and sequencing of course material makes it easy to follow and integrate the theory. The sequential release of material interspersed by the  zooms works wonderfully. The thorough transcripts of the questions is really helpful and so are the resources. I'm currently studying another course online over the same period of time (for twice the price!), and it is really difficult to follow and poorly presented. So, thank you so much. 

Jade FrederiksenLevel 2 Yoga Teacher, Founder of Anglesea Yoga

Donna is changing the way Yoga is learned and taught

Donna is incredibly generous in showing her experience, knowledge, research, and love. She's changing the way Yoga is learned and taught, and an incredibly strong woman and role model for generations to come.

Alli Black
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