Yoga Teacher Training Should Teach You How to Teach

A yoga teacher guides a student through a pose in a serene, sunlit studio during a group class.

Yoga Teacher Training Should Teach You How to Teach

I’m going to say something plainly, and I mean it seriously.

A lot of yoga teacher trainings teach people a lot about yoga, but not enough about teaching yoga.

And I’m not saying that as an outsider. I’m saying it as someone who has built a life around teaching.

I am a high school science teacher. I’ve taught adults in vocational centers overseas in Afghanistan. While I served in the Air Force, I trained adult Air Force personnel. I’ve also taught sciences at the elementary level for a bit. Across all of those environments, different ages, different cultures, different learning needs, one thing has always been true.

Teaching is its own craft. Knowing a subject does not automatically mean you can teach it well.

Yes, most YTTs include more yoga, anatomy, and philosophy. And those pieces matter. Asana is visible, trackable, and motivating. Philosophy can shape a teacher’s integrity and depth. A personal practice can be a powerful gateway into breath, awareness, and self study.

But certification should mean more than knowledge. It should mean instructional ability. The ability to guide real human beings safely, clearly, and effectively.

Practitioner and teacher are not the same job

Some of the strongest minds in their fields are not great teachers. That’s not a moral failure. It’s just how skill works. Teaching requires a different set of competencies.

• Clear communication that is concise and timed well

• The ability to read a room in real time

• Knowing how to progress or regress a pose on the spot

• Reaching different learning styles and personalities without losing your message

• Creating emotional safety and trust, which directly affects physical safety

• Holding boundaries and staying within professional scope

• Teaching what matters most today for the students in front of you

A person can do advanced postures and still not know how to help a beginner find the basics without confusion, overwhelm, or shame. A person can love yoga deeply and still not have the leadership skills required to guide a room.

Students practicing the triangle pose with yoga blocks in a studio setting, focusing on alignment and balance.

What the standards prioritize

Yoga Alliance’s 200 hour standards are organized into four required educational categories with set minimums: Techniques, Training, and Practice (75 hours), Anatomy and Physiology (30), Yoga Humanities (30), and Professional Essentials (50).

Many trainings do include teaching methodology and practice teaching somewhere in these hours. But teaching has to compete for time alongside everything else: anatomy, history, ethics, business, and the trainee’s personal practice development.

When teaching is treated like a unit, graduates often leave with more knowledge but no reliable teaching framework and no confident voice.

How learning to teach is treated in formal education

If you become a certified teacher in the U.S., you don’t just study content. You study pedagogy, how to teach, and you complete substantial supervised clinical practice.

NCTQ describes clinical practice as extended, full time classroom experience under an effective mentor teacher and evaluates programs based on the length and quality of that immersion.

And even with all that structure, new teachers still report gaps in preparedness. OECD’s TALIS 2024 reporting includes preparedness measures where many new teachers report not feeling fully prepared in important competency areas.

This matters because it reinforces the point.

Teaching readiness doesn’t happen accidentally. It takes practice, feedback, reflection, and real world repetition.

Yoga wisdom written on a vibrant wall emphasizes that with a dedicated teacher, yoga can be practiced and taught anywhere.

Nervousness is normal, but this is different

Yes, new teacher nervousness is normal. Teaching your first 20 classes will stretch you. Your voice may shake. You may over cue. You may forget your sequence and speak too fast.

That is normal.

What I’m talking about is different.

Some graduates leave trainings without knowing how to structure a class with a clear beginning, middle, and end. They can’t create a sequence that builds skill instead of just moving fast. They don’t know how to cue breath in a practical and embodied way. They struggle to offer modifications that protect dignity and build confidence. They can’t teach mixed levels without losing half the room. They do not yet have a strong teaching voice.

That’s not first class jitters. That’s a training gap.

The missing data and why Maydwell is measuring it

There isn’t a simple, widely published industry statistic that clearly answers the question: What percentage of YTT graduates feel ready to teach?

You can find standards and review systems, but not a clean readiness percentage that is consistently reported publicly.

So at Maydwell, we treat it like professionals. We measure what matters.

Because “I feel ready to teach” should not be assumed. It should be trained for and evaluated through actual teaching practice.

Teaching vocabulary that belongs in yoga teacher training

In education, there are technical terms for what great teachers do. Your studio is a classroom. Your students are learners. Your class is a lesson.

Here are a few teaching world terms every yoga teacher should understand.

• Learning objectives: What students should be able to do or understand by the end of class, not just what you plan to cover.

  
  

• Backward design: Start with the outcome, for example steadier balance or safer forward folds, then build the class to support that outcome.

  
  

• Scaffolding Layer skills: stable foundation, accessible variation, deeper expression, and reverse it when needed.

  
  

• DifferentiationTeaching: the same concept to different bodies and levels without shaming, overwhelming, or confusing.

  
  

• Formative Assessment: Real time observation: breath quality, tension, stability, alignment, fatigue, then adjusting your cueing accordingly.

  
  

• Cognitive load: Too many cues equals overwhelm. Great teaching prioritizes one or two key points that actually land.

  
  

• Classroom management: Energy, pacing, safety, space, boundaries, tone. The room can feel calm and purposeful or chaotic based on the teacher’s leadership.

  
  

If your training doesn’t teach these skills and doesn’t give you repeated practice using them, it’s not truly preparing you to teach.

You’re becoming a yoga teacher, not a fitness instructor

This is important.

You are not graduating to lead one sweaty, impressive, high intensity class every week. You are not earning a certificate to perform poses at people.

Your responsibility is deeper than that.

You are guiding human beings into connection with themselves through asana, breathwork, nervous system regulation, concentration, meditation, and self awareness, in whatever form your lineage and class style supports.

That doesn’t require a philosophy lecture every class. Let’s be real. You may have 20 bodies in front of you and 60 minutes to serve them well.

But if students come back week after week, they should be learning new yoga vocabulary over time. They should be learning variations, to deepen, to back off, to adapt. They should be learning safer, smarter ways to practice. They should be developing skill, awareness, and self trust.

A yoga teacher is a guide. Not a dictator. Not a performer. Not a drill sergeant. You’re giving students tools so they can explore and make decisions intelligently on their own.

What Maydwell does differently

At Maydwell, we take the word teacher seriously.

Yes, your personal practice matters. Yes, you’ll learn yoga and philosophy. But the priority is this: we teach teachers how to teach.

That means voice training, clarity, cadence, pace, confidence. It means cueing with purpose.

It means structured lesson planning, a clear beginning, middle, and end with a skill building arc. It means learning to teach mixed levels without leaving beginners behind. It means real time decision making, when to progress, regress, pause, or simplify. It means feedback loops where you teach, reflect, revise, then teach again. It means professionalism, ethics, boundaries, and scope.

Because teaching is not a title to take lightly. If you’re serious about guiding people, you should be trained like it.

If you’re considering teacher training

Ask this before you enroll:

How much of this training is dedicated to practicing the craft of teaching: speaking, cueing, managing a room, sequencing with purpose, and adapting to real students in real time?

If the answer is vague, you may be prepared to be a better yogi, not necessarily a better teacher.

And those are not the same.

If you want a certification that simply proves you completed hours, there are plenty of programs for that.

But if you want to carry the title “teacher” with integrity, then your training must prioritize teaching. Because real people will walk into your class trusting you. Their bodies, their histories, their nervous systems, their confidence, their injuries, their breath. That’s not casual. That’s responsibility.

At Maydwell, we train you for that responsibility.