People talking during my class while I'm instructing

Seeking Advice

I teach a barre class and sometimes there are up to 20 people in attendance. When it's a large class, there is a lot of energy, especially on a Saturday morning. However, I have a few students who will not stop talking during class. Sometimes it's side conversations, sometimes it's loud singing, other times it's one person complaining about a routine. Last week I had someone ask if they were almost done planking and was like are you even counting? I have had other students complain about others talking in class to me and it also is extremely distracting to me as I am trying to count music, instruct, and make sure people are being safe.

I have tried; asking at the start of class for people to please not talk during class, sending out multiple friendly reminder in our newsletter, cueing breath, have said "if you're talking you're not breathing", I've stressed the importance of breathing and how talking can create unsafe situations, I have waited for people to stop talking, have turned turned the music up (they talk louder), and I have also shut the music completely off (they keep talking). I also do a meditation at the end of class and they will talk through that as well even when I say please come into some silence, for some of us this is the last 5 minutes we have to ourselves. Not sure what else to do as I don't want come off as rude.

Can any yoga/barre/pilates/group fitness instructors give me some advice? I'm too sacred to have a side bar situation but know that it's probably the next step. I also teach yoga and never have this issue in my yoga classes... only barre.

Posted Mar 6, 2026, 9:52 PM UTC

321
Loading comments…