Learning to Share in Ballet

When your child starts dancing with Amelia’s Ballerinas, there are so many things she is learning. It’s not just about Plies and Pirouettes, she is also learning:

* how our lessons are structured,

* the right time to listen, to talk, and to dance,

* building a relationship with her teacher,

* listening and following instructions,

* building confidence to join in independently,

* how to fit in with the group activity,

* how to persist when something is difficult,

* how to wait her turn and share with other children,

Plus many more. Phew!

Learning to share is one of these skills that is really important, not just in ballet class but also outside of the classroom. It’s something every child must learn…and every child struggles with at some stage!

How do we support this skill in ballet class?

There are many ways, big and small, that we help our ballerinas learn to share.

Props

I use lots of different props with my little dancers and they are always a highlight of each week. Rainbow wands, bean bags, butterfly wings, princess crowns- it’s so much fun! Some weeks our dancers get their favourite colour bean-bag/wings/wand, and other weeks they must settle for second best. This is a simple way to introduce taking turns, as although they might not get the pink scarf, there are still a whole bunch of beautiful colours to choose from.

Exercises

Lining up and waiting for their turn is a skill that I introduce from our Junior Class level. There are many exciting ways we can do this but a favourite is when we use the butterfly wings and take turns leaping! It can be hard to wait your turn and let the other children go first but it’s a great way to learn to share, especially for our bold, enthusiastic children who always want to go first.

(It’s also a great way to help boost our children who are more shy- they can be really nervous having a turn by themselves so I make sure to give them lots of praise when they do it!)

Being the Leader

Once our dancers are comfortable in class, they really enjoy being the leader. Maybe we are marching around the round, or being animals looking for food, or being at the front of a line. When I ask “Who would like to be the leader?”, their hands shoot up in the air! This is another great opportunity to take turns and learn how to share.

When it gets too hard...

Some of my ballerinas start with me when they are only 2 or 3 years old and the whole concept of sharing can be really tricky. One of the best ways I have found is to distract or redirect my little one’s attention.

“Here, look at this beautiful wand! Let’s use this one” or “Look, your friends are already waving their wands. Let’s go join them!” If it’s really bad, they might need a cuddle too, or a moment to vent their frustration out before they are ready to join in the fun again. It’s not often I get a full blown tantrum…they must save those up for at home!

By the time my dancers are in our Seniors class, sharing is part of being a good team mate, which is one of our core values.

Ballet and Dance can get a bad rap for being full of competitiveness and outright bitchiness (shows like Dance Moms certainly don’t help!) But our group is different- it’s a positive, safe, and supportive environment for all our dancers and this means we support each other. It’s so wonderful to see my Senior Ballerinas helping each other out. The other week, one of my girls was sad that she didn’t get Pink wings as she wanted to be pink that week, and two of our other dancers offered to swap to with her- well done my darlings!

They also cheer each other on and this weekend I even overheard them negotiating among themselves over the Solo parts in our upcoming recital.

“I want to be Peter Pan,”

“OK then, I can be Wendy,”

“Could I be Tinkerbell?”

“Oh yea, you’d be a great Tinkerbell coz you are cheeky just like she is!”

What a wonderful bunch of girls!