Since 1993, I think, I've been collaborating with Peggy Kelley to create teacher training programs that prepare people to be Iyengar teachers. For the past three years I've been revising our program, and it just went through another major edit. I'm including information below on the dates and general structure of the teacher training program we are starting up again next September, and I'm including some general information covered in the curriculum.
It's a two year program. We can only post next year's dates (nine of eighteen in all) on the calendar, but please know there will be a set of nine more monthly meetings in the next cycle, 2018-2019, in the same months, at (hopefully) evenly spaced intervals.
Topics covered in the two-year curriculum:
Anatomy and physiology
Bones, joints, muscles, connective tissues, movements
Organ systems: digestive, elimination, urinary, cardiac, respiratory, circulatory,
lymphatic, endocrine, nervous
Western and Yogic views of anatomy and physiology
Philosophy
Patanjali Yoga Sutra, into the third pada
Bhagavad Gita, first six chapters and selected others
Yoga philosophy, Samkhya philosophy, and the history of yoga
Asana
We use only the method of practice and teaching of BKS Iyengar
We study intensely 74 asanas laid out in the teaching syllabus for Introductory Iyengar
teachers
Older texts like the Hatha Yoga Pradipika are researched for information on the technique
and effects of poses
We keep notebooks and ask questions of ourselves and our teachers about our practice
and what we do and do not understand.
Pranayama
We intensely study 12 or so basic pranayamas and their effects, with all the extra notes about
asana above.
Teaching
Participants attend regular classes 1) to be students and learn the poses, and 2) to
observe teaching, and in our monthly sessions 3) students practice the elements of effective
teaching using drills that focus on separate, targeted aspects of the visual, verbal, and
psychological ways of teaching yoga.
There are nine meetings per year, September through May, happening once a month and skipping the summer months June to August.
Materials for each monthly meeting are contained in a Module, which includes either reading assignments, or summaries of information, reprints, and links to information used in the session.
Whether you work by attending our monthly group trainings, or if you work independently as an apprentice at Clear Spring, you will study and practice your way through the modules one by one. In any case, when you complete the program you will know more than enough to pass an assessment to become an Iyengar yoga teacher.
You might take some more time to hone your teaching skills before attempting an actual Iyengar certification assessment. Two years of strong study is enough to get the basic information stable and accessible in your mind, and to be inspired by the discipline. It will take another interval to digest the learning enough to be able to improvise with it-- to teach a known pose to a roomful of unknown and unpredictable bodies and minds.
Here are our 2017-2018 meeting dates:
September 23-24
October 21-22
November 18-29
December 2-3
January 27-28
February 24-25
March 24-25
April 21-22
June 2-3
Note: if you are joining our Austin Iyengar Yoga formal program, the first meeting begins in September, just like an academic year. If you miss the beginning session or two, you need to wait till next year to enter. If you are working as an apprentice and not attached to the group program, you can begin when it suits you, coordinating a schedule you work out with Devon for feedback and mentoring, and working through the homework assignments attached to the modules.
Ask Devon for more information on teacher training. You can have a look at the modules to see what they are like as well.