The event was originally due to be held at the Maria Montessori School in Exeter, but due to demand for places the location for the day was moved to the hall of the nearby Royal School for the Deaf. Hosted by MSA Region 7 Chairman, Lesley Milmine and her Deputy Michelle Patten, the meeting began with a welcome and introduction by Liz Sharpe, Chair of the MSA National Council. She then handed over to June Rowlands of June's Yoga (www.junesyoga.co.uk) for the first part of the workshop, which covered warm-ups, postures and partner postures. Over lunch Ruth Bloomfield, owner of Maria Montessori School and trustee of Montessori St Nicholas kindly took delegates to look around the Maria Montessori School. It proved almost impossible to drag everyone away from this inspirational school.

After lunch delegates reconvened to watch June teach a short workshop to a small group of children from the Maria Montessori school. This gave delegates first hand experience of seeing the theory they had learnt in the morning sessions put into practice.

Then it was straight into the afternoon session, which covered relaxation and calming; lesson planning and a Q & A session. Feedback on the training was fantastic: One delegate wrote: " I have long wanted to introduce yoga into my nursery, but didn't know where to start. Thank you MSA."

The day was rounded off with a feedback session with Liz, Lesley and Michelle. Concern was raised during this session about the respective roles of MEUK and MSA. A minority of delegates expressed the view that there appeared to be an inability on the part of the two organisations to work together. Lesley confirmed that whilst nationally the overall picture was somewhat unclear, regionally she was in discussion with organizers of the MEUK Forum to hold a joint meeting in the future.

The region covers a large geographical area from Cornwall in the south to Wiltshire in the east and includes all of Wales. There are 32 schools in the region. These are clustered in three areas — around Bournemouth, Bristol and Exeter. The intention is to try to rotate the termly meetings between these three points to allow access for everyone.

The date of the next Region 7 meeting will be Saturday 11th November 2006.