Saturday, January 29, 2011

Micah's First Formal Dance Training

While Micah's first dance class was kind of a fun class for kids age 5-7 to figure out what kind of dancing they liked, in the fall of 2008, he began his first formal dance classes specifically in tap and ballet. This time there were 2 separate classes for each dance instruction. Here he began learning more distinct moves in both his ballet and tap.

Again, he was the only boy, yet it never seemed to matter to Micah. He still loved to dance. While he was quite shaky at first, he was learning. Somehow he would figure out how these other kids kept their balance and kept so coordinated.

Here is Micah in his level 1 ballet dance class:



He even began learning some small jumps:



In tap he began practicing for an upcoming Christmas recital:



He still had a lot to master, but he was having a lot of fun!


Thursday, January 20, 2011

Jewelia Begins Dance

Jewelia, as a little 2 year old, had watched her big brother start dance and be in a recital and she wanted a part of it too.

She wasn't old enough for dance yet, but when she turned 3, we found a little dance class and signed her up. She absolutely loved it!

I think mostly she just loved the princess ballet dance clothes that she got to wear.

It wasn't much, but she got to do a little bit of dancing. She wasn't so clueless as the other kids, as she had a big brother to watch.

Here are a few videos of Jewelia's first dance experience:

This first one is for tap,



And then a little Princess ballet:

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Dance Lessons for a Boy?

Micah was about 7 years old when he first came to me asking about dance classes. He was a different kid. We had put him in sports but he didn't seem to like them. We tried gymnastics, t-ball, and soccer, and he didn't want to have anything to do with them.

When he was in 1st grade, he went on a field trip to see the Ballet West Nutcracker at Christmas time, and then after that it was all he talked about. He wanted to dance too, and not just any kind of dance, he wanted to dance ballet!

Micah had a thing where he walked mostly on the tips of his toes. It was a bad habit, and we had fought to correct it, but nothing much was working. I suppose he already looked like a ballet dancer the way he could prance around on his toes without much thought, but maybe we could stick him in tap classes as well and he would be forced to hit those heels down. Hmmm.....

We looked around and we found a dance class that offered kids from 5 to 8 ballet, jazz, and tap all in one. So, our little Micah boy went to learn to dance.

Here is a video of his first dance experience. This was during the tap section. (Sorry it is sideways!)



I thought how cute for a little boy to be in a dance class. Not so sure what my husband thought, but he was very tolerable and wanted to give Micah a chance to try something new that he wanted to do, so he allowed it. Cute Micah was the only boy in the whole dance studio, but he seemed so happy and enjoyed it.

We started him in dance in April of 2007 when he was 8 years old, and he was able to perform in his first dance recital 2 months later. He looked so cute in his little yellow suspenders and bow tie!

Here he is performing "Banana Phone":