Ballet
Posted on Sunday, June 6th, 2010 at 9:40 pmI have been wanting to start dance lessons with London for quite some time. Being thin and flexible, I thought she would do really well. I still think she has potential, but her first show last Saturday was quite amusing. It doesn’t help that we missed a couple of classes and that she’s never done this before and that she only started a couple of months ago. She’ll get better. She’s only four. She has another show coming up in a couple of weeks. I’m excited to see her progress. I think she’ll know the routine a little better next time around. I’ll post the video on our videos page for any of you who would like to see it.
It’s interesting for me to be around kids and parents of kids. Having taught elementary school and having a child almost ready for kindergarten, I meet a lot of kids who are very busy. I sometimes think they’re over-scheduled. I can see how that could easily happen. I want my children to be able to do activities that they enjoy and if I don’t sign them up for things, how will they know what they enjoy? Right now London is in 2 ballet classes (just because one will end soon and I had to sign up with the other one in April to get the amazing deal that we have since it’s now TWICE the price I pay) and a pre-school class. Next year she will be starting kindergarten and I plan to keep her in one ballet class if she’s still enjoying it like she does now. I see all sorts of her friends signing up for soccer and swimming and other activities. I’m glad we don’t have to run around like crazy all the time, but sometimes I start thinking of other activities she might enjoy. I have always wanted to teach her a musical instrument. Being a music teacher and having started violin lessons when I was four, I’m not a huge advocate of starting kids really young. It’s funny that I say that when I started really young. My mom must have been crazy. But then I see how London loves to play the piano and sometimes pulls out her violin to goof around. Sometimes she even asks me to teach her things. Is she ready for that? Am I ready for that? I don’t know. I guess only time will tell.
I agree with you on music lessons with young children. I was five when I started but I, like many of my teachers, agree that six or seven is a more ideal age. I actually teach piano to a couple of Reed’s friends, but he prefers not to have me help him. I am totally fine with my five year old being self-taught! Neither of us is ready for me to be his piano teacher.
I have to say that with the dance background I have London did very well. That was way to long of a song for 4 or 5 year olds to try and remember everything. I loved how their little white butts would peak out when they walked! So cute!