Christmas Time

Each year we get to do several dance performances and since there are so many opportunities to check out we don’t always get to do the same thing twice. This year even though we weren’t doing a Christmas recital, I still really wanted to incorporate all the awesome Christmas songs I get to hear all month long into our dance classes. I put together a plan for our Christmas parties and was very much looking forward to it. And I had so much fun this week.

I always make sure each class is quizzed on dance steps that they’ve learned to win prizes so I kept that tradition going and added a different challenge for each class as well. The two Tiny classes learned a combination to “Up On the Housetop” and performed it for their parents at the end of their Christmas party. The Mini class all gave their input to Miss Jessie on what steps they liked best and created a fun dance to “All I Want For Christmas Is You.”  The Juniors and Seniors pulled their style of dance and song out of a hat and created jazz, tap and ballet dances to “Santa Claus Is Coming To Town,” “Jingle Bell Rock,” “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” and “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree.” Last but not least, the Adult class took the combination of steps from their tap dance for the recital and set it to 6 different Christmas songs to see how it would change the speed and feel of what they are usually doing.

I hope that they had fun because that of course was the goal of the Christmas party class. I had a great time because I learned so much watching them. The littlest dancers love showing their moms and dads dances and they seemed to enjoy getting to sing along with some of the words. The creativity of the Mini class knew no bounds! They put in tap steps, jazz steps, ballet steps and steps that they made up. They attempted dance steps that they’d seen the older girls do and they didn’t hold back at all! The Juniors and Seniors not only showed me their creative sides with this challenge but also their abundant knowledge of steps they have learned over the years. Each girl in those classes was working hard to put in as many steps as they could think of to make their dance look perfect. Everybody jumped all in to my silly challenge and I think it definitely was my favorite Christmas party year yet. I say this all the time but I mean it, they make me so proud!

Now we rest, enjoy the holidays and come back ready for performance season.