Photo by Caroline Boyer. Enlarge photo.

Tierney Thompson, left, and Cece Williams stretch during the Dec. 12 Zen Friends yoga class at the Bonner Springs Family YMCA. Cece is a student in Thompsons special education class at Bonner Springs Elementary School. Thompson taught her students yoga last year and said it helped them learn self-confidence and focus.

At their second-to-last class before Christmas, young yoga students tried out a few poses renamed for Christmas-related symbols at the Bonner Springs Family YMCA.

When it came to the Star otherwise known as the Half Moon Pose a few of the young students took some time to figure out the correct placement of their hands and feet.

Youve gotta listen to your body, instructor Tierney Thompson told the young students who struggled. Youve gotta say If it hurts, then Im not going to do it.

But Cece Williams got the pose down quickly, and in a game at the end of the class, she chose it as her favorite pose. It was probably a little bit easier for Cece because she spent much of the 2011-2012 school year learning yoga with Thompson, who also is her teacher at Bonner Springs Elementary School.

Tierney Thompson, special education teacher at Bonner Springs Elementary School, discovered last year that yoga was a skill that really helped the students in her class. Now, she has created a class to make yoga available to all children. These photos were taken at the Dec. 12 class.

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Beginning next week, Thompson again will offer the Zen Friends: Yoga for All Kids classes Wednesday evenings at the YMCA.

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Yoga classes serve children of all abilities