Pregled Stanje, Mladinski Klas II
Progress Evaluation, Youth Level II
At the end of November, the ballet school where I teach had evaluations of class progress. The children had to memorize their entire class and perform it without my help. They were evaluated on their performance and given notes about what they did well, and what they needed to improve. Evaluations will be held again in February, and Final Evaluations will be held in May, to determine placement for next year.
After the evaluation class, parents were allowed to attend a class. One of the parents of my Youth Level II class was nice enough to take pictures for everyone. Here are some of them.
Izabela and Ursa performing a preparation at the barre. I'm happy to see that both are inclining their heads correctly.
Here I'm trying to help Neza with the position of her hips. Usually I wear practice clothing to teach, but since this was a special class for the parents, I tried to look professional. Also, if I wasn't in practice clothes I would be more apt to let the kids dance for themselves.
Neza and Tihe perform port de bras back. I'm happy that their shoulders are mostly squared off (or at least trying very hard).
Ursa has very good body placement, for the most part, but things can always be better!
Before we do grande battement (the only exercise in which this class lifts their legs) I make them stretch. They love to hate it.
Releve is the last thing we do at the barre.
I try not to talk too much in class, especially because usually I'm butchering the language. But some things need explaining. Front line L-R: Anamaria, Tina, Ursa. Back line L-R: Izabela, Neza, Tihe.
Working with Tina's arms while the class practices tendu to the side.
I'm not happy with anyone's leg placement in this picture, but I LOVE that I can feel them dancing through their arms, and that they all have a sense of their upper body. There's a word in Slovenian, "drza," it approximates posture, but also has to do with how you present yourself to the world. This is good drza.
Anamaria, Tina, and Ursa are practicing promenade with soutenu. I am yelling at them.
I am proud of this picture because they are all performing saute with feet more or less pointed, and their bodies are straight and their arms are held . . . and it's in the air!
Neza, Tihe, and Izabela extending their legs nicely before they perform glissade.
We have just begun to prepare for pirouettes in this class, working on having a solid passe position.
I LOVE this picture of Izabela performing grande jete (I put a book on the floor and tell them to "leap over the puddle"). Her positions may not be absolutely perfect, but they're definitely going in the right direction . . . and you can just see the dance shooting out from her toes and fingertips. She's soaring.
As they left class I handed them their results from the evaluation. I could hear them in the dressing room afterwards saying "What did you get?" to each other. When they came back to class I noticed that, while they seemed to acknowledge the things they need to work on, they paid special attention to the things I said they did well, and performed them with pride.
So, overall, I think we had a good result this fall!
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