Online Live Video Yoga Forum Group eStudy Sessions for your Questions
Another medium I have been exploring options around is the notion of online video based learning groups. As it stands, I am clear that I have no wish to engage in pre-recorded mediums through posting online ‘teaching videos’ or ‘podcasts’, or setting up remote viewing video subscription processes for online webcasts, where there is no live interaction or possibilities for a two way multi-face dialogue.
Personally I feel that pre-recorded remote learning or catch-up Webcasts, or learning at leisure facilities that increasingly abound today are not really comparable to a two-way live learning interaction, even if it is online. I am a Yoga teacher who likes to meet and chat directly with students interested in my Yoga studentship with TKV Desikachar and thus want to offer a resource that can share directly and respond immediately to questions around personal Yoga practice, practice theory, textual study or Yoga teaching.
However I do increasingly appreciate the value of online learning resources. So this past couple of years I have been considering options where small groups of students can come together online within a live direct exchange environment to study within a specific area or topic focus, albeit with one caveat. This is that we must all be able see each other online and interact face to face, not just voice to voice, or text based format exchanges, as if a small group studying in a live situation.
Regarding this criteria I have been exploring whether the video technology around at this point in time can support such a request, rather than the more usual video conferencing facilities currently available. In this respect I am looking ahead to the autumn release of a facility for group based FaceTime video calls and I am proposing to initiate a project hopefully based around this option. Alternatively I am also looking at Skype’s group video calls facility as a more generic option.
Either way the intention behind this offering is to establish an online live video Yoga forum group eStudy sessions where you can put your questions around personal Yoga practice, practice theory, textual study or Yoga teaching. There will be no subscription required and it will live or die according to your interest and input in terms of questions and the interaction between them and my responses, based on my understanding formed from my studies with my teacher.
I am looking at an initial offering of a bi-weekly free meeting on a fixed weekday at around 18.00GMT in order to connect with those across other time zones. If this proves to be useful and supportive I will look at increasing the availability, albeit within the balance between my current teaching and non-teaching monthly diary. Plus this could evolve into other group options, exploring fixed topic developmental studies such as the Yoga Sūtra verse by verse, or even progressive Āsana practice theory.
This page will be updated over the autumn period once I have had a chance to get more hands-on with the video options, including the possibility of these being live recorded for attendees to have as an on-going reference. From here I will suggest a process by which we can establish a group for those interested in participating, given enrolment considerations and a limit on numbers set by the software available and my own wishes for a teaching intimacy.
