Inviting little ones to pause and find their inner calm
Pick of the week: December 15th, 2025
Clinical psychologists picking kids books rooted in mental health science 🌸
Peaceful Piggy Yoga: A picture book about self-regulation for preschoolers (age 3+)
Each week, we recommend one kids book that teaches a mental health concept. Today, we’re sharing Peaceful Piggy Yoga written and illustrated by Kerry Lee MacLean. This book highlights the concept of self-regulation — the idea that practicing pausing our bodies can help build our capacity for attention and listening (which is great for parents 🙂). Read on to learn why we recommend Peaceful Piggy Yoga to the parents we know, the science behind self-regulation, and tips for talking to your kiddo about pausing our bodies.
About the Book
In Peaceful Piggy Yoga, we are introduced to an adorable group of pigs who explore the joys of yoga. With bright, colorful illustrations and clear instructions, this book guides young readers through a series of fun and simple yoga poses to help them move and settle their bodies from head to toe. It also reminds us that yoga can be a great way to help us focus our minds, build connections with loved ones, and calm our bodies before a stressful experience (like taking a test). This book highlights that yoga is an activity for all, even piggies!
What Science Tells Us about Self-Regulation
What does yoga (which involves holding poses while doing breathing exercises) have to do with paying attention and listening? All of us have impulses all the time to do things, say things, touch things, grab things, and go places. Learning to regulate these impulses is a crucial life skill. For example, many kids love to pet dogs, but it’s important that before petting a dog they see on the street, kids pause and check with their parent or the dog’s owner.
Self-regulation skills are crucial building blocks for kids’ flourishing. Why? Being able to resist some impulses or tune out some information to focus our attention is necessary for almost all of life’s “hard tasks” — listening to our parents, sitting still in class, being gentle with our peers, doing our homework, and more! Because of this, self-regulation appears crucial for helping kids lead happy and well lives.
But how can yoga help with self-regulation? During yoga, kids develop self-regulation skills by inhibiting impulses (e.g., running around the room) while focusing on other activities (e.g., holding a specific pose). Research supports this: One meta-analysis found that yoga improves self-regulation for kids and adolescents. Another meta-analysis found that yoga can specifically help kids with attention difficulties (like ADHD), who are known to have challenges with self-regulation.
Peaceful Piggy Yoga shows how yoga can help children focus before a test or unwind before bedtime. We love how it also supports smoother transitions by helping kids shift from high-energy play to calm, focused activities like homework, reading, or sitting quietly in the car, the library, or religious services. Yoga offers a positive way to redirect their attention, giving them something to do rather than only telling them what not to do.
How to Use Yoga to Boost Your Child’s Self-Regulation
Try out these prompts for trying out yoga with your kiddo:
What Marin likes about Peaceful Piggy Yoga: I love that each page explains the purpose of each different yoga pose (one pose “brings oxygen to your brain so you can think more clearly”). Having a purpose in mind when you are doing a new activity can help both kids and adults understand why it is worthwhile to try something new (and maybe a little uncomfortable). These statements also help emphasize that yoga isn’t about perfection; it’s about trying out different poses and seeing what works for you and your child!
What Betsy likes about Peaceful Piggy Yoga: I love how this book emphasizes that yoga is for everyone — it shows football piggies, ballet piggies, and all sorts of piggies doing yoga! What a great way to bust the myth that yoga only works for certain people. I also love the beautiful, painted illustrations.
Go deeper on the science and practice of self-regulation:
If you or your kids prefer videos to help you learn and practice new yoga poses, check out these 12 instructional videos for kids from the Cleveland Clinic.
Parents who want to learn more about self-regulation and executive function might be interested in this TedTalk by a cognitive psychologist.
This scientific article will take you deeper into the science of why yoga may help with switching tasks.
Does your kid love pretending to be an animal? Check out this awesome book with video examples to learn yoga poses inspired by all kinds of animals!
We think Peaceful Piggy Yoga would be a great addition to any child’s library. We’d love to hear your reactions to this review and your questions about self-regulation. Reply to this email, or join our community to leave a comment!
FYI: The links above for buying Peaceful Piggy Yoga are affiliate links (see this page for more information).