Chloe's Blogs

A blog used for EDCI 336

Tag: freeinquiry

Final Inquiry Post

March 29, 2024 / / 0 Comments

Well, this is my last inquiry post for EDCI 336! Overall, my inquiry went really well. My question (will doing yoga for 15 minutes daily help my mental health/anxiety) was pretty much answered. Doing yoga daily did not provide me with quick/right after benefits like I had thought it would, but rather provided me with a more lasting effect that made my overall mental health better in general (but not particularly right after doing yoga).

The best part of my inquiry is that it helped me to prioritize self-care during a busy semester of school. Without this inquiry, I likely would have continued to do my workouts, but I would not have really done any other form of self-care. 15 minutes was a reasonable amount of time to take out of my day to do the yoga, and it was obviously worth it (as it definitely helped with my mental health throughout the semester). Doing yoga also comes with benefits not related to mental health, and I have definitely experiences some of those over the last few months. A list of benefits to doing yoga can be found here.

One thing that did not go as well with my inquiry was that I felt like I didn’t always have much to say each week. Most weeks seemed to be about the same, until a few weeks ago, when I realized that my mental health was improving as a whole. Even after that though, all I had to say in my post was that I was feeling good and yoga was helping. If I repeated this process again, I think I would do updates less often, and only post when something changed or seemed worth it to mention.

I loved the format of this inquiry, as it gave us a ton of freedom and thus we could all choose topics/questions that we are interested in. I will definitely be using inquiry projects when I am a teacher. Depending on the age and the students, some student inquiries might need to be a little more guided by the teacher, but regardless, I enjoyed having the freedom in this course. I will definitely be incorporating inquiry based learning when I’m a teacher!

Photo by Markus Winkler from Pexels.com

Week 11 Inquiry

March 29, 2024 / / 0 Comments

This week’s yoga sessions went well. Most days I felt good mentally, but I felt like my body was carrying some stress. My muscles felt tight and sore throughout the week, but I always felt better after my yoga sessions. On Tuesday I followed a Youtube pilates video, and while it felt intense to do that and then yoga, my body felt good. It felt pushed in a good way. I was worried that I would feel really sore the next day, but I didn’t!

For the few days when my mind felt anxious and stressed, the yoga didn’t really help. I still find it strange that I don’t often notice a change in anxiety level following my yoga sessions. Yoga is well known to help with anxiety, so I am very surprised that it hasn’t helped make me feel better mentally right after doing it. Like I mentioned in a previous post, I do think my mental health is better in general, and that is likely from doing the yoga. So although I thought that yoga would give me some quick and maybe short term benefits, I have found that the benefits from yoga are more general and long lasting. My overall mental health is generally strong, and I believe that is from doing the yoga (as I have not changed anything else in my life, and I am still crazy busy).

I have heard from many different people that anxiety is often stored in our hips. I found a yoga video that is specifically for anxiety, and it focuses on opening up the hips. My goal for next week is to try this video and record how it makes me feel! This is the video:

What yoga videos have y’all tried and liked? I am always looking for videos that others have found helpful!

Week 10 Inquiry

March 22, 2024 / / 0 Comments

I felt pretty good this week! Most days I felt good both mentally and physically. Even when I encountered car problems (on Thursday), I handled it well and my mental health was still strong. Like I mentioned last week, I think my mental health as a whole is doing better because of my daily yoga sessions.

I had a particularly good and helpful yoga session on Saturday, as I was feeling down and then doing yoga made me feel better mentally. I made note that I was not anxious, but rather feeling down. I wonder if yoga improves my mental health more when I am feeling sad, rather than when I am feeling anxious. This would be a surprising finding for me, since I started this yoga journey to help specifically with anxiety (and not sadness or depression).

I found a super interesting and informational article that talks about how doing yoga might help reduce depression and sadness. According to the article, because depression/sadness and stress/anxiety are closely related, things that are good for one are likely good for the other.

Next time I am feeling sad, I think I will try following a yoga video that is geared toward reducing sadness and depression. Hopefully it will help me to feel better after, like it did on Saturday. There are a few to choose from, but this is one I would like to try in the future.

Now that I am thinking about it, have any of y’all used yoga to help lessen depression or sadness?

Week 9 Inquiry

March 15, 2024 / / 0 Comments

Week 9 was a busy week for me, and that showed in how my body and my mind felt. Most days my mind felt busy/overwhelmed, and my body felt tight and/or sore. I always felt better after doing my yoga sessions though. Similar to prior weeks, my mind/mental health usually felt similar after doing my yoga, but my body and muscles almost always felt more relaxed and less tight. I think I hold a lot of anxiety in my body, so when I am anxious mentally, my body often will also feel uncomfortable. Despite the fact that the yoga doesn’t usually make my mind feel better right after doing it, my body always does, and that’s still a major win for me! I haven’t had time or found the motivation to follow any YouTube yoga videos this week, but hopefully next week I can.

This might be off topic, but I usually go on my elliptical for my workouts, but this week I had a day where I really didn’t want to do it, and so I decided to follow a pilates video on YouTube instead. It wasn’t yoga, but it was an easy-to-follow workout that incorporated stretching and strength training. Then I did my yoga after, and it felt great. Let me know if y’all try this workout and how it goes! I had a good experience with paring it with yoga, so let me know if you pair it with yoga like I did!

Week 8 Inquiry

March 1, 2024 / / 0 Comments

Photo by Prasanth Inturi

Over the reading break I had enough time to watch and follow along with a new YouTube yoga video. I chose to try Short Wake Up Flow By Yoga with Adriene, and I really enjoyed it. This yoga session video made me feel more energized in my body and mind!

I skipped my yoga session on Friday that week, as I had a busy day spending time with family and friends. Surprisingly I didn’t feel guilty about missing a session. Although I didn’t take care of my mental health by using yoga, I strengthened my mental wellness through social interaction. As I’ve said before, the whole point of this inquiry is to improve my mental health, so I am not going to stress myself out over missing a day of yoga, (especially if its just because I had fun plans and was busy).

Over the last couple weeks, I have been noticing that my overall mental health has been really good lately. Looking back at my tracking document, I definitely can see that I have been feeling better mentally more often than before. This is the case even when looking at how I feel before doing the yoga. So although the yoga sessions don’t always make me feel way better mentally right after, I think they might be making me feel better in general.

Lastly, I talked to my learning pod this week and everyone’s inquiries seem to be going well! Michael finished reading a book on talking to strangers, and it sounded very interesting. Rick and Emma’s inquiries also sound like they are on track!

Week 6 Inquiry

February 24, 2024 / / 0 Comments

Photo by Elina Fairytale from Pexels

This week’s yoga yielded very similar results as last week. After almost every yoga session, my body felt very relaxed and calm. This is not the case when I do a workout and then my yoga session right after though. This pairing, when done back to back, usually makes me feel more energized than calm. Regarding my mental health and the yoga, sometimes after doing yoga I feel slightly better mentally, but not every time. In addition, sometimes I find that meditating during the session helps me feel better mentally, but I am still not very good at it, (and so even when I do it, it doesn’t always help). I find that it is easier to meditate when I don’t have very much on mind and am not very anxious. When I am very stressed or anxious, it feels almost impossible for me to meditate, and then I don’t feel any benefits from it. Obviously when I am anxious is when I would benefit most from meditating, so I’ll just have to keep practicing.

I haven’t been able to follow along with a yoga video this week, but next week is reading week so I know I’ll have more time for that soon. I think I want to watch a different video from the last one and see if I can find one that I like even better. Some options that I think could be fun to try next week are Fill Your Cup Yoga by Yoga with Adriene, Short Wake Up Flow by Yoga with Adriene, and Morning Miracle Flow with Jessica Richburg. I think all of these videos would be great options for me to try in the coming weeks.

Week 5 Inquiry

February 16, 2024 / / 2 Comments

I finally did a morning yoga session and followed an energizing yoga session from YouTube! The video I followed was called 15 Minute Energizing Yoga Flow. I really enjoyed it, although my body still felt quite relaxed after doing it. Despite the fact that I didn’t feel exactly energized, it was nice to have a routine to follow along to. I always find it little bit challenging to follow a yoga session for the first time, as I am always a little confused about what moves I am suppose to be doing and when. Next time I do this routine I know it will be easier to follow.

All of my other sessions throughout the week went well too. I ended up doing my yoga sessions later in the day (either before bed or after working out) for the rest of the week. Similar to last week, I have found that yoga definitely helps my body to feel less anxious and more calm. My mind after doing yoga usually feels similar to how it feels before going the yoga, but sometimes my mind feels a little more calm after. I often try to meditate during my yoga sessions, but I find it especially difficult to meditate when my brain is busy or anxious. I’m practicing it though, so hopefully I will get better at it. I think focusing on practicing meditation (in a addition to practicing yoga) might be helpful in reducing the anxiety I feel in my mind.

Week 4 Inquiry

February 8, 2024 / / 0 Comments

Inquiry by Nick Youngson CC BY-SA 3.0 Alpha Stock Images

This week of yoga went well for me. I found time to do it every day for at least 15 minutes, and I enjoyed it most days. I know I wanted to try watching and following an energizing yoga session this week, but I ended up doing my yoga before bed or after my workout everyday this week. So it just didn’t work out. I will try again next week for sure! As I did my night time yoga sessions, I felt very relaxed after each one. My mental calmness/anxiety before and after the yoga sessions were usually similar, but my body always felt more relaxed after.

Also, I did yoga after my workout on Wednesday and thought it would energize me like it did last week, but instead I ended up just feeling tired after that session. I am curious now about whether my hypothesis from last week was correct or not. I am not sure if doing yoga after my workout actually does energize me…I will do it when I can, and write down how I feel after. I’ve been keeping track of my inquiry process by writing in a journal how I feel before and after my yoga sessions. My journal entries can be found here.

My Friday session was a notably good session. I went into it feeling anxious, but came out of it feeling quite a bit better after. I tried meditating during my session since I was stressed and overthinking, and I felt better both mentally and physically after that session! I think I will start doing that more and see if that helps my mind feel more calm.

Unfortunately I had to skip my Sunday session because I was sick. I started to feel disappointed in myself about missing a session, but I reminded myself that I am only human, and life happens! Hopefully I will be able to get back to it soon.

Week 2 Inquiry

January 20, 2024 / / 0 Comments

Creative Commons Image

Inquiry projects are all about exploring and learning about a topic that interests a person. I think inquiry projects are a great way to motivate people to learn because everyone can do their inquiry project on a topic that they are already interested in, and dive deeper into understanding more about that topic or interest. Thus, inquiry projects are often very student-centred (although this depends on parameters the teacher has set for the student’s projects).

One of my interests is yoga. I do yoga off and on, but not enough to see many benefits. It is somewhat common knowledge that yoga can help reduce stress and improve mental health. In addition to yoga, mental health is also one of my interests. Thus for my 336 inquiry, I wanted to put those two interests together. So I came up with my inquiry question, which is, will doing yoga everyday help with my mental health while being in a busy semester of school. I have always enjoyed school, but it can get stressful. Since yoga is known to help reduce stress, I would like to see if that is the case for me.

I am feeling really excited about this project because I can use it to explore free inquiry and also focus on improving my mental health and keeping my life balanced. I have decided to do 15 minutes of yoga daily. I will use my own knowledge of yoga, as well as online sources to help me find moves to do for each yoga session. I will make notes throughout the week on how I feel after each session, and then summarize them on this blog at the end of the week. I will begin on Monday Jan. 22, 2024. Stay tuned for updates and progress posts!

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