A virtual intensive is a fun and fast-paced online dance experience designed with older dancers in mind who are looking to challenge themselves to add new dance styles + moves to their skill set, improve their technique, learn choreography, as well as focus on aspects of performance, such as story-telling and character development. Below, is a general overview of what your dancer can expect in a virtual intensive:

Virtual Intensive Schedule: 1:30-3pm, Monday- Friday

1:30: Greeting/Overview of Intensive for the Day

1:35- 1:50 Warm up + Across the Floor

1:50- 2:00 Center work

2:00- 2:10 Go over Homework + Introduce Daily Focus (i.e. new style of dance, character development, etc)

2:10-2:30 Activity Related to Daily Focus

2:30- 3:00 Choreography for Weekly Routine

Additional resources, daily dress-up themes, and homework to be sent out to students at the end of class. Resources include dance videos related to the theme of the week, craft + game activities, behind-the-scenes footage from professional productions, and playlists to listen to at home.

Click HERE to see all our current, upcoming Summer intensive offerings! Hope to see you on the virtual dance floor soon!

Welcome to Miss Hayley’s Virtual DIY Workspace!

She’s a DIY queen, Cookies +Crafts Club cheerleader, and an SDAtwater dance mom! Miss Hayley always brings BIG smiles and sparkles to the studio. We live for her Fri-DIY videos, and the exciting times she’s hosted one of our  Cookies+ Crafts Club meetings.

Now, you can bring this special experience home to you and your little ones, with our C+C Club kits! Fabricated by Miss Hayley, you can take your pick from over 10 different, prepackaged kits to keep your kiddos creative at home during this time. Follow the link here for more info: https://reachforthebarres.com/boutique/

These days, you can find Miss Hayley keeping her energetic 5 year old busy and educated. You better believe she’s staying creative as ever; she’s already painted a rainbow wall at her home and experimented with alcohol ink paintings. She’s also been spending more time outside in her garden as well as the kitchen, cooking up new recipes for her family… and maybe even a couple cookies, too ;)

She’s thrilled to be sharing some of her Top 3 picks for Children’s Books, Movies, and Music below! We hope you and your dancer enjoy!

Top 3 Children’s Books: The Good Egg by Jory John, How I Met My Monster by Amanda Noll, Fancy Nancy Series by Jane O’Connor

Top 3 Children’s Movies: Hook, The Little Princess, Tangled

Top 3 Tunes to Dance to: Move Your Feet/ D.A.N.C.E. / It’s A Sunshine Day – Trolls Soundtrack, I’m Still Standing- Sing Soundtrack, Dance Monkey, by Tones and I

 

Welcome to Miss Kris’s Virtual Home Dance Floor!

Hailing from Pennsylvania, Miss Kris always knew she wanted to pursue a path in performance. She’s a quintessential triple threat with not only a passion for dancing, but also, singing and acting as well. With more time at home these days, she’s been exploring additional creative outlets such as drawing, cooking, and writing scripts. But being a dancer while quarantined can be a challenge, so she keeps moving by riding her bike and continuing her training for an upcoming marathon. Whenever it happens, she’ll be ready!

She’s thrilled to be sharing some of her Top 3 picks for Children’s Books, Movies, and Music below! We hope you and your dancer enjoy!

Top 3 Children’s Books: Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown, Love You Forever by Robert Munsch, Charlotte’s Web by E.B. White

Top 3 Children’s Movies: Monsters Inc., Frozen, The Grinch (Dr. Seuss) Jim Carrey & animation versions

Top 3 Tunes to Dance to: Walking on Broken Glass, by Annie Lenox,  Gloria, by Laura Branigan,  September, by Earth, Wind, & Fire

IT’S BRING YOUR PARENT TO CLASS WEEK!

Dust off your dancing shoes, parents! We wanna see your moves!

Your dancers have joined us week after week for virtual dance class, and now it’s your turn. So we wanted to give you our Top 3 helpful tips for a successful virtual dance experience with us:

  1. Have your equipment ready before class
    What you’ll need: yoga mat, chair (barre), and your dancer :) Hydration is important, so, while it’s not required, we recommend bringing a water bottle, too.
  2. Pin the teacher on Zoom
    To avoid distractions from other dancing families, be sure to pin the teacher as the biggest screen to watch.
  3. Follow along
    This seems pretty obvious, but have you ever heard the phrase, “Monkey see, monkey do”? Well, your dancer will be watching you to see how well YOU participate in virtual class.  For those of you who feel you haven’t had success yet with getting your dancer to do virtual classes on their own, this is a GREAT way to show them how its done. It’s easy, simply listen and follow along.

**Other important things to note, not only for this class, but all virtual classes to come:**

As we head into our 9th week of virtual classes, many of you have expressed that it’s been a struggle to get your dancer excited for yet another virtual experience, staring at screen. We want to let you know… we TOTALLY get it, and it’s been a challenge for us as teachers, too!

We’re all craving human connection right now, which has been suddenly shrunk down to staring at pixels of people we were once able to hug and shake hands with only 50 something (who’s counting anymore???) days ago.  This is a new life experience for  all of us, so what we’ve perceived as “normal” might not necessarily be the same right now, and that’s O.K. It probably shouldn’t be.

One thing that remains true during this time, is that kids learn in many different ways, one of those being through observation. While it may not be your preference, even if your dancer is simply sitting, watching class, and eating a snack while they do, it is still a form of learning. So, we implore you to not be discouraged by your dancer’s lack of activity during class; rather, we’d encourage you to use Bring Your Parent to Class week to model the kind of behavior you’d like to see from them as we look ahead to the end of the season.

By dancing along side them, we’re hopeful that for those of you struggling with your dancer week after week, this opportunity will re-energize the both of you about how you want to finish out this dance season. Bring Your Parent to Class week can be EVERY week if you want it to be, because if you find that your overall experience with your dancer is more enjoyable when you’re with them, then you are more than welcome to come take class with them the rest of the season! We only have a few weeks left, so why not make the most of it?! Might be nice to switch up the routine a little bit ;)

We can’t wait to see you all on the virtual dance floor soon! BIG virtual hugs and kisses to you all! – The SD Atwater Team