Standing posture: Awareness in standing posture

Physical therapy

﻿Hi there, my name's Sophie Brazier. I'm a children's physiotherapist. Thank you very much for joining me today. We are going to be continuing with the topic of posture, but we will be looking more closely at standing posture. So a little bit later on, we will be doing an activity and standing doing a little bit of a posture check. So if you do have a mirror, it may be a good idea to be doing the activity in front of a mirror. And if it's a full length mirror, then even better, but if you don't have a mirror, then do not worry. You can still take part in the activity. I would just like to give you a little message from our team. We as therapists have tried to think of the best way to continue to support children, young people and their families. So you may be watching this as a child by yourself, or you might be with a parent or carer. We will be exploring topic areas, that we regularly provide advice and support on across all ages and abilities. And each lesson we will aim to give you some ideas and activities that can be carried out either at home or in school. You may already have specific programmes that you're using or advice that has been given to you by your child's school or therapist. So please make sure that you're using any information, I am giving you alongside anything you already have. And if you do have any questions or would like help tailoring this to their needs, then please make sure you get in contact with your local therapy service. You may remember, we looked at why is standing posture important in line and in sitting in lessons 4 to 9. So now I just like to go through the same, but in standing posture. So why is good standing posture important? It is important because we need to be keeping the 'S' shape of the back for a healthy spine. We need to have good alignment in weight bearing, which helps bones, joints, and body parts stay healthy. And it means that your muscles, will be working more efficiently. So there'll be more energy for standing activities, and you'll be able to keep going for longer. Having a good standing posture can really help with your communication, your breathing and your digestion. If you've got a really good standing posture, you're really opening up your chest, you're making sure that all those processes, can happen easily. And it also gives you better balance and stability. So when we're in standing, we have lots of times when we may become off balance. So it's good to have that initial starting standing posture. That is really nice so that we have better base of support for leading into other activities. And you may remember back to lesson one when we had to look at how our spine works and why it is important. So I'll just show you the spine again. And here is a model of the spine, and I'm just going to show you, the natural curves in it again. So you've got your natural 'S' shape of the spine. So you've got where your head is up here, and this is where your pelvis is just here and your tailbone, and that's from a side view. And then this is from the back. And again, it's just to remind you, about how intricate our spine is and how much amazing detail is in that part of our body. So we do really need to look after it, in all postures that we're in. So it's just as much as important in standing as it is in lying and in sitting. I'm now going to take you through a little body check, for posture and standing. So probably a good place to start is at the bottom. So if we think about our base of support, we're going to be thinking about our feet. So for your base, you want to have a nice distance apart between your feet. You don't want to have them too close together. Otherwise you might become unbalanced. And then think about your knees. Your knees don't want to be pushed back into an extended position where they're dead straight. And some people do have extra movement in their knee. So you might find this as a comfortable position, but a good standing posture, you'll have a slight bend in your knees and your knees could be slightly relaxed. You don't want to have them too bent, but a nice gentle relaxation in your knees. Then moving up to your hips and your pelvis. You want to be thinking about an aligned position. You don't want to be thinking about sticking your bottom out too much, or having it tilted too much the other way, you want to have it in a neutral position. So sometimes it can help by saying, tuck your tailbone in and later in the activity, we'll go through the body check and I can demonstrate this to you. The next point is your back and your neck. So in your back, you need to be thinking about maintaining those natural curves and in your neck, you want to be keeping it in a neutral position, not poking your chin forward too much or not taking it back too far. So you want everything in a nice aligned position. And then the last thing to think about is probably your arms. You want to have them in a relaxed position too. So all those points contribute to a body check, for your standing posture. I've put together some points to remember, for helping you in standing. So four important things to think about. So carrying bags, when you're carrying bags, this might be a school bag, or it could be some shopping bags. You want to think about how you are carrying them. So when you're standing and carrying something, are you carrying something on one side? Is it really heavy? So does it make you uneven and unbalanced? Perhaps for a school bag, you might want to think about getting a backpack so that you've got your weight evenly distributed, over both shoulders, rather than having one bag on one shoulder and leading to some asymmetry where you've got, one shoulder higher than the other. Whereas a bag over both shoulders will help keep you nice and stable. And again, if you've got heavy shopping bags, you might want to distribute the weight into two bags, so you've got the weight is distributed evenly, on both sides. You also need to think about the correct way to pick up objects. So when you're bending down to pick something up, when you're standing, you want to think about bending your knees and using those big muscle groups in your thighs, rather than arching your back and bending over. And I think sometimes we do this without realising. So it's just important to stop and remember, and next time you do it think, Oh, am I bending my knees and try that and see if it makes a difference. So then third point, readjust your position. Use support if you can. So this just means if you're standing for a period of time, try not to stay in one static position for too long, you might need to readjust your position and use support if you can, if you need to hold onto something or perhaps lean against something. And make sure you do or take some weight off your standing position by perhaps sitting and interchanging it with standing if you can. And the last point there, exercises or stretches. So you may have exercises or stretches that you've been given by a therapist already. So if you have been given these, it's really important that you are doing them and building them into your day. And also a last point to remember is about keeping active. So even those small active things, you're building into your day will help contribute to a healthy standing posture. How about we look at this activity, for your standing posture. I'd like you to be in a standing position. And ideally if you could do this in front of a mirror, that would be great. But if you don't have a mirror, it's not a problem. A mirror would just give you some good visual feedback, so you're able to see and make those corrections and see what you're doing. So stand in that position and just think, is it a good or ideal standing posture? And then I'd like you to correct your position so you can use the body check, we previously talked about in slide four. I'm going to take you through the body check for your standing posture. Let's talk through your body check for your standing posture. So begin with, it's a good idea to start at your feet. So you don't want to have your feet too close together when standing because this can send you off balance. So a nice position to start with is to have your feet about hip distance apart, so your feet below your knees, below your hips. And ideally, if you can have your feet flat on the floor, say the soles of your feet in contact with the floor, that's a good place to start. And then your knees, you want to have a slight bend in your knees. If I show you from the side, what can happen is, if you lean back on your knees, you're pushing your knees into a fully extended position, you won't have a slight bend in your knees. So again, your knees over your feet, then you're moving to your hips and your pelvis, which is in this area here. You want to have your hips in a nice, natural, neutral position. So for your hips, some people's hips naturally tilt forward a bit. So their pelvis might be in a tilted forward position, or they might have their pelvis, where it tilts back slightly. If you can, ideally, you want it in this middle position, So not too far forward and not too far back. Okay. So hips nicely stacked above knees above feet. And then thinking about your back and your neck, think back to your natural curves of your spine. So maintaining that S shape in your back. You are not rounding your back in this position and you're not sticking your chest out too much. You've just got a nice neutral curve in that position. Okay, and then if you think about your neck, you want to be keeping your neck in a nice aligned position at the top of your back. You don't want to be having your chin, peaking too far forward or too far back. You want it in a nice relaxed position like this. And the final thing is your arms. So sometimes it can be difficult to know what to do with your arms in a nice, relaxed, standing position. So a good way to think about it, is if you take a deep breath in and a deep breath out and just let your arms relax by your side, because then you're really opening up your shoulders and you're keeping them in a nice, relaxed position. So that's a great idea for a body check. You could go away and try that. So following the demonstration of the body check of your standing posture, let's just break it down a little bit further and think about four things. So how was your comfort in those positions? Did you feel more comfortable in the corrected position, after you'd had a look in the mirror? What do you think about your position? Did you feel more balanced in the corrected position or did it feel slightly strange? Sometimes changing our position and correcting our posture can feel a little bit different to begin with because your muscles, are being held in a slightly different way, but over a period of time, your muscles will adapt to the more normal aligned position and it will feel slightly easier. Now think about your breathing. Could you take deep breaths in the corrected position? Did it feel more relaxing? Did you feel like your chest had more space, when you really thought about relaxing your shoulders and opening your chest out more? And the last point to think about, your focus. Could you see everything clearly in front of you? Did you find it easier to pay attention to things? So this is just a little bit about, if you're in a comfortable position and you're not feeling fidgety, you're more likely to be paying attention and concentrating on the task or activity that you're doing. So that's just something to think about. Now that leads me to say thank you for joining me today. I hope you found that a useful lesson and got some ideas and tips about your standing posture. Please join me again next time for lesson 11, when we will be looking at standing posture again, and I'll be giving you some ideas and activities of exercises to do when standing. Take care and I'll see you soon. Bye.

Standing posture: Awareness in standing posture

Standing posture: Awareness in standing posture

These resources will be removed by the end of the Spring Term 2026.

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