Grande Plié

As promised, this is a list of how our ballet class is sequenced. We sure are learning lots of new french words!

First we do some stretching:

Butterfly legs, Stretch down, Twists, Stomping
V legs, Arms up, Side to side, Wiggle arms, To middle patting
Shake legs

Then we do drills: Starting on the Red line walking forward to the purple line then backwards on the way back

Arms above head, walk on toes
Arms down low, run on toes
Arms out like a Butterfly, pointy toe leg out then step
Passé - Hands on hips elbows out, like a flamingo toe to knee then step
Coupé - Hands on hips elbows out, Toe to ankle then step
Grand Battement (Bat-Ma) - Arms out straight T, kick leg straight out then step
Chassé - Arms out straight T, foot to slide sideways then together like a skip
Run and leap - Over star 1 then 2 then 3
Glue feet together and hop across

Then everyone is assigned a position on the floor (Stand on X)

1st position - Feet in v arms make circle resting at waist
Plié - bend knees while in 1st Position

2nd position - Feet apart, Arms in T

Tendu - Extend leg out point toe forward, to side, to back

Sauté - Jump, 1st position
Sauté - Jump, 1st to 2nd, close / open 1-2
Tours en l'air - Turn on air

Pirouette - Start as a Plié then jump and turn, One arm out Second arm folded in front
Turn Left then right

Balancé - One arm out Second arm folded in front, Start as a Plié then step like a Waltz or square step
To the Side, Then Back The Forward then Back

Dance Ballerina Dance

Here is Holly in her Ballet class. We attend on Mondays. Afterwards we usually head to Child watch for a few minutes sometimes longer if her friends come too and she is having fun. The little boy in the green shirt with the Tutu on is Nico, he is Holly's favorite classmate. The Girl in the Blue Tutu is Sophie, we went with her to the Library one week and she has a gymnastics class after ours on Wednesday so holly and her are becoming friends. The little girl with the long dark hair is Kara, we had met long ago at a meet-up event but hadn't stayed in touch until we just recently crossed paths again. Other kids are magnolia and Lily who both knew Nico before hand. In this class there are only 6 kids, there are two other little girls who are super shy who come on occasion but don;t always participate. In general it is pretty small and Holly likes it a lot.

You can see several phases of the class in these pictures, they start with open dance if they are early, as you can see that entails holly doing little spins and pirouettes. She loves looking at herself in the mirror and she often gets distracted doing so. Next they usually get into a circle and then do some stretches and warm ups. You can see in this section just how tight Holly is and what high tone she has. In the picture with V legs and the arms above there heads you can see one little girl with straight up arms, and then you can see Holly with bent Elbows and her hands just resting on her head. This is the highest she can stretch two arms together by herself. When reaching she can stretch a single arm up in similar fashion to the other kids, but often she is actually bending her body to the off side so if you are paying attention to her positioning the arm isn't up strait against her ear, but more out at a 45 degree angle and then she bends to make it go up, or even sometimes it is more in front of her rather then to the side.

In Gymnastics we are practicing hanging to help stretch her out, you can see how uncomfortable she is in this position and she can only hang for a few seconds and then either from a weak grip or uncomfortableness will let go after a few seconds versus other kids hanging and swinging for several seconds to minutes. After the circle the kids usually line up on one side of the room and either together or one at a time depending they cross the room to the other side stopping on the line and either skip or do toe touches or side heel to calf steps, skips and other various steps.

Later they all stand on an X and learn a few more positions and phrasing and do some more dance steps, and then it is usually open dance with the scarves. During one of the classes I wrote down every single move and step they preformed and a description of what they were like so we could practice at home. The practice has not happened yet, but I will post the detailed class description with another round of pictures another day.

After class we headed to Kindergym to play with Nico and some of the other kids, climbing, jumping, and building a fort. lots of fun,

Downtown Berkeley Library

Here we are at the Library. We headed over there after Ballet the other day. Sophie is a new friend from ballet, and Kara too. Holly has enjoyed playing with them after her class. The library is really cool, we particularly like the Good Night Moon room.

Let Me Show You How I Grove

Here we are at our new Ballet Class. Holly is making lots of new friends. Nico a little boy in the class is one of her favorites, I think she likes the male energy. magnolia and Lily are two other girls in the class. Sophie and Kara the last two. She is doing a great job making friends, following directions, learning her new dance moves. We are having a lot of fun.