On-going education is vital... Knowledge is power!

Education

Cara Reeser provides advanced study weekends and webinars for Pilates instructors, bringing a breadth of knowledge and experience. Stimulate again your commitment to Pilates and add a layer to your wisdom as an instructor.

One of her education platforms is Movement Science Made Simple.
See the MSMS workshops she is currently offering there: https://movementsciencemadesimple.com

Cara Reeser Pilates Course Offerings

Pilates Protocols for Stronger Neck and Freer Shoulders
1 or 2 days (the number of CEC hours are negotiable)

A strong and supple spine must include our necks! Adequate neck strength and alignment helps facilitate freedom and ease for our shoulders. In this course, we will learn: exercises, images and cues to help our clients build neck strength and control in all ranges of motion. We will understand how current, popular cuing that leads to the over-correction of our shoulder complex often actually thwarts our ability to use our necks well, resulting in a restricted range of motion for the rest of our spine. Basic anatomy of the neck and shoulder complex will be reviewed. Smart and effective Pilates movement protocols will be explored.

The Pelvis Spine Connection
1 or 2 days (the number of CEC hours are negotiable)

As Pilates practioners and teachers we spend a fair amount of time and effort exploring and explaining the importance of good spinal articulation. In this course, we will examine ways in which the movements of the pelvis on the femurs is essential for allowing our spines to articulate well in flexion, extension, lateral flexion and rotation. In order to properly understand how to move our spine in all directions we need to have a basic understanding of its joints, and of the articulating surfaces of the pelvis on the femurs. This course will offer a simple anatomical review of these joints and will provide preparatory movement protocols that will help inform and encourage reasonable and healthy spinal articulation while performing exercises from the Pilates repertoire.

Kathy Grant Retrospective
2 days (the number of CEC hours are negotiable)

Kathleen Stanford Grant began her studies with Joseph Pilates in the mid 1950’s in his New York City studio. In the years that followed, she carried on the work she learned from her teachers Joe and Clara Pilates, her mentor Carola Trier, and many other movement teachers she worked with along the way. Teaching what we now call Pilates.

Kathy taught with a deep understanding and sensitivity; she was, in her own right, a healer, using her imagination, her experience and her intuition as her guide. In the five decades that she taught, she developed a stunning vocabulary, view and method that she passed along to her closest students. In this course, Cara will share a very personal and treasured collection of exercises, images, and stories through her lens.

Students will learn and practice a large variety of the movement vocabulary that Kathy taught Cara. Using the mat, props, and all of the classical Pilates equipment. Student’s will learn useful techniques and exercise variations that allow for increased movement potential for the diverse and deserved population that are our clients in today’s contemporary Pilates Studio.

Safe, Stress-free Strategies for Spinal Extension
1 day (the number of CEC hours are negotiable)

In this course, we will focus on developing safe and stress-free strategies for well executed spinal extension in our Pilates practice. With an eye towards proper alignment and timing of the muscles of our back, posterior hips, neck, and shoulders, we will explore how extension exercises become more accessible for the diverse body types we coach daily. The goal is to gain confidence with spinal extension while increasing mobility and function. Increasing extension protocols in our Pilates practice helps improve the postural tendency toward forward slump and promotes health to the aging spine. The skills we will be explore employ both traditional and non-traditional exercises.

The Perfect Preparation: Skill Building for Full Expression in your Pilates Practice
1 day (the number of CEC hours are negotiable)

In this course Cara will share some of the Pilates preparatory work developed by her mentor, first generation Master Teacher Kathleen Stanford Grant. Kathy Grant brought a great wealth of knowledge and creativity to the work she taught. Kathy believed in “warming-up” her students prior to beginning the exercise protocols that Mr. Pilates taught her. She nicknamed the preparatory sequence that she developed “Before The Hundred.” Students will learn some of these skill building exercises, derived from both Kathy’s vocabulary and Cara’s. The aim of these exercises is to allow our clients to achieve more control, greater range, and improved alignment. Students will ultimately learn to express themselves fully and with confidence while practicing the traditional Pilates mat program.

The Inner Gym: Breathing Exercises for Core Control
1 day (the number of CEC hours are negotiable)

Among movement teachers and rehabilitation professionals alike, it is considered important to strengthen the body’s trunk musculature, or “core”. To do so in a functional and healthy way, we must include in our concept of “core” not only the abdominal and low back muscles but also the thoracic diaphragm and the pelvic floor. Because these muscles are also intimately involved in breathing, good core training requires breath training – what I call the “Inner Gym.” In this course, we will learn a repertoire of breathing exercises, techniques, and cues to improve the use of the breathing mechanism as a strong foundation for movement. This course is open to movement teachers from all traditions.

The Advanced Reformer
I day (the number of CEC hours are negotiable)

In this course, we will take a “building blocks” approach in learning to meet the demands of the advanced Reformer repertoire. These exercises require a high level of motor control, coordination, balance, strength, and flexibility. We are asked to finely tune our efforts in a changing relationship to gravity and our base of support. Instructors will learn valuable tools for performing and teaching the advanced work on the Reformer, and will have an opportunity to try it all in a safe and non-judgmental environment.

Big and Bold Moves: A Journey into Spinal Extension and Arm Standing
1 day (the number of CEC hours are negotiable)

It is often at the end range of expression in our moving bodies that we hesitate and pull back. In this course, we will work towards the full expression of back bending and arm standing. With a playful approach: an eye towards alignment, range of motion, strength building, and proper mechanics students will take the journey towards these big and bold movements without holding themselves back. Starting from the most basic skills, participants will be challenged to take risks in their personal back bending and arm standing practices, in a safe and light hearted environment.

Movement Science Made Simple Course Offerings
(2-3 day workshops with Cara Reeser and Jeremy Laverdure)

About Movement Science Made Simple
Most movement teachers and fitness instructors have studied human anatomy, but it’s difficult to make good use of that knowledge without some understanding of physiology and kinesiology. Movement Science Made Simple is a series of courses designed to teach Pilates and Yoga instructors the essentials of movement science in a way that can be immediately applied to one’s practice and teaching.
In each course’s Lecture component we will:
• Review musculoskeletal anatomy in depth, including an overview of ligamentous structures.
• Learn joint structures, kinematics, and normal ranges of motion.
• Introduce basic concepts from motor learning theory.
In the Lab component we will:
• Perform simple exercises to translate the lecture material into
classical Pilates and Yoga movement.
• Look at different bodies to familiarize ourselves with normal
variations in structure.
• Develop new ways of seeing and cuing movement based on a more complete understanding of the body.

The MSMS Lectures draw on Jeremy’s graduate studies in anatomy, physiology and kinesiology and Cara’s experience as a dance educator and master Pilates teacher. To the Lab, we bring our decades of
practicing and teaching Pilates, a deep practice of Yoga, and years of tutelage under such movement visionaries as Kathleen Stanford Grant, Irene Dowd, Barbara Mahler, and Nancy Topf.

More info and specific course offering go here:https://movementsciencemadesimple.com

Movement Science Made Simple Workshop Fees:
contact us for bookings and pricing for US and abroad.

E-mail carareeserpilates@gmail.com or info@movementsciencemadesimple.com if you would like to discuss a traveling workshop to come to your community!