Therapeutic Yoga for Down Syndrome & Hypermobility
Building strength, grounding, and confidence through supportive, embodied movement and breath.
Therapeutic Yoga & Somatic Practices for Down Syndrome & Hypermobility
Strength, Stability & Embodied Confidence
This public module offers an in-depth exploration of therapeutic yoga and somatic practices to support children, teens, and young adults with Down syndrome, with particular attention to hypermobility, hypotonia, postural stability, emotional regulation and embodied confidence.
Rather than focusing on correction or performance, this course centers empowerment, joy, relationship, and building trust in the body. Practices are designed to help individuals feel supported, capable, and safe in their bodies, honoring each person’s unique strengths, needs, and pace.
Grounded in strength-based, developmentally informed, and relational approaches, this module emphasizes stability before mobility and connection before complexity.
Down Syndrome, Hypermobility & Embodiment as Core Learning
A central focus of this course is understanding how low muscle tone, joint laxity, and differences in motor planning impact movement, endurance, coordination, and self-confidence in individuals with Down syndrome.
Participants will explore:
- Hypotonia and hypermobility and their impact on posture, balance, and fatigue
- Why strength, grounding, and joint stability are foundational
- Proprioceptive and interoceptive support for safe, organized movement
- Motor planning and coordination differences
- How therapeutic yoga and somatic practices can provide organizing, protective sensory input
- Designing practices that support confidence and success rather than over-effort or collapse
This learning is experiential and practical, supporting participants in feeling stability, support, and clarity in their own bodies while learning how to offer the same to others.
What This Course Explores
Through discussion, experiential practice, and clinical reflection, participants will learn how to support:
- Strength, stability, and postural organization
- Grounding and sustained attention
- Proprioceptive and interoceptive awareness
- Motor coordination and functional movement
- Nervous system regulation and emotional balance
- Confidence, agency, and trust in the body
Practices emphasize clear actions, support, repetition, and choice, supporting safety and accessibility for diverse bodies and nervous systems.
Strength-Based, Relational Approach
This course centers:
- Individual strengths and capacities
- Stability over flexibility
- Support over strain
- Joy, connection, and relationship as therapeutic foundations
- Trauma-educated, developmentally responsive care
Participants will gain both conceptual understanding and practical tools they can immediately integrate into therapeutic, educational, clinical, and community-based settings.
Who This Course Is For
This module is well-suited for:
- Yoga teachers and yoga therapists
- Mental health and somatic practitioners
- Occupational therapists, educators, and allied professionals
- Anyone working with children, teens, or young adults with Down syndrome
No prior specialization in Down syndrome is required—this course is designed to be accessible, inclusive, and immediately applicable.
Course Details
🗓 Saturday, April 18
⏰ 9:00–12:00 PM Pacific Time
💻 Live on Zoom
🎥 Recordings available (if unable to attend live)
✨ Registration is now open.
This course offers a thoughtful, embodied exploration of yoga therapy for individuals with Down syndrome—supporting strength, safety, confidence, and a sense of belonging in the body.
Course Investment
💰 Early Bird Registration: $165
🗓 Available through April 6
💰 Regular Registration: $195
(Applies after April 6)
Your registration includes live participation on Zoom as well as access to the course recording for 6 months, allowing you to revisit the material or participate if you’re unable to attend live.
Looking Ahead: Upcoming Public Modules
✨ Next Public Module:
Therapeutic Yoga for Teens with Scoliosis
This upcoming module will explore therapeutic yoga to support spinal organization, balance, strength, confidence and embodied awareness for teens with scoliosis with guest teacher Rachel Krentzman (Yoga Therapist, PT, Hakomi Practitioner)
👉 Click HERE to view details and register for a la carte public modules
Want to Go Deeper?
You can also explore the full 100-Hour Yoga Therapy for Youth Training & Certification, which brings together all public modules along with additional in-depth learning to support comprehensive, trauma-educated work with children, teens, and young adults with complex needs.
👉 Click HERE to learn more about the full 100-Hour training
Your Instructor
Shawnee is a C-IAYT -Certified Yoga Therapist, Somatic Experiencing® Practitioner, M.Ed., and Educational/Behavioral Specialist. She is the Founder of Asanas for Autism and Special Needs and the Founder/Director of Yoga Therapy for Youth Certification Program. Shawnee has worked with children and adults with and complex and diverse needs for 30 years. She has specialized in working with children and adults with neurodiverse needs, sensory processing challenges, communication differences, developmental disabilities, mental health challenges and trauma backgrounds. Shawnee works with private clients of all brains, bodies and abilities to facilitate health and healing. Her goal is to bring the experience of yoga to all individuals no matter their differences or challenges.
She has written two published a books, Asanas for Autism and Special Needs – Yoga to Help Children with Their Emotions, Self-Regulation and Body Awareness and her second book - Yoga Therapy for Children and Teens.- Embodying a Somatosensory Approach to Mental, Physical and Emotional Wellbeing has just recently been published and is NOW AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE! She is also the creator of the C.A.L.M.M Yoga Toolkit and Body Sensations Curriculum.
She has a Yoga School through Yoga Alliance in order to train others in yoga approaches to support children and adults with neurodiverse needs and children and adults with complex needs needs and travels globally to share her teachings. Shawnee is dedicated to helping support youth and adults in developing strategies to cope with stress in order to live happier, healthier more empowered lives.
Shawnee has experienced first hand the benefits yoga and somatic practices can provide to health and overall well-being as she is a survivor of childhood trauma as well as multiple significant traumas in her adulthood, resulting in a diagnosis of PTSD. She is also a cancer survivor. She has a unique combination of understanding neurodiversity, developmental disability, trauma and other complex needs and knowing how to support people of all ages in connecting to their authentic self and building more capacity and resilience in order to live life in a more embodied and empowered way.
Shawnee has led several workshops at major conferences both in the US and Internationally; including MISTY (Montreal International Symposium for Yoga Therapy) and IAYT (International Association of Yoga Therapists) SYTAR Conference on Yoga for Sensory Processing and Self-Regulation for children with ASD, BOOST Conference (Best Out of School Time) on Yoga for Children with Special Needs , Yoga and Mindfulness for Youth and Yoga to Reduce Stress and Increase Relaxation for Educators. TRUST Conference (Teens Understanding and Reflecting Stigma Together) on Learning to Breath, Yoga and Mindfulness for Teens, including teens struggling with mental illness and UCSD Bridging the Hearts and Minds of Youth Conference on Yoga and Mindfulness for Sensory Integration and Self-Regulation.
Shawnee has written for and has had her work featured in several magazines,podcasts and online resources. See media features here.
Shawnee also offers private and small group therapeutic sessions for children and adults as well as yoga and somatic movement workshops and trainings through her company Embodied Wellness Yoga Therapy.