Dance - not good at acro

[DanceMumTaxi]

Dd does absolutely loads of dance. She’s only 7 but competes with a group and in solo’s. This week she’ll be at the studio 6 days (it’s a lot, but she loves it, does well at school etc so it’s not a problem for us). She’s pretty good and has won quite a few solo’s with her song and dance, but her acro isn’t good and I feel it’ll really hold her back and she gets upset about it. She can do forward rolls, head to feet, cartwheels/one handed cartwheels, drop back into bridge from standing. But can’t do an ariel, kick over, front/back walkover etc. She works hard but is scared. Her front splits on both legs are good, but I feel like her acro is really going to hold her back. So many of the routines seem to be full of acro tricks. Has anyone whose dd/ds dances got any advice please? Did they get better as they got older? How did you help? Or are some just naturally very talented at acro. I’d really like to help her. Thanks dance mums/dads.

I wouldn't worry to be honest. A lot of adjudicators don't like acro tricks in dances. So as long as her dance technique continues to develop then she'll be fine.

Thank you, I was hoping that might be the case. It’s just that she see others of a similar age being able to do them when she can’t. They’re everywhere in modern routines but they’re even starting to creep in to things like lyrical and contemporary now too.

I don’t know anything about dance but I’m guessing a lot of dance kids will also do gymnastics (or have done it in the past) and get taught these skills there.

Depends what she goes onto do. 6 days a week is A Lot. Can you talk to the dance teacher if worried?

Mine did gym and they didn't do "tricks" that young as they wanted to build up their strength first...

But lots of dancers don't do acro (ballet for example?) If the school is very acro focused that might factor in your thinking but 7 is so young to be worrying about competitions etc, or to feel not good enough.

Also if she does acro- won't they teach her in her acro class...

acro and dance teacher here. First of all let’s just emphasise that she is 7, and a lot of the moves you mention require a lot of strength- some children are naturally much stronger than others and so find acro easier, for others it’s a very slow and gradual process to build up the required strength for these skills.
You say she can backbend to bridge- is this fully controlled and slow or does she drop to her hands? Also how is her recover (standing up from a bridge)? How tug it is her bridge- are her shoulders stacked over her wrists or are her hands out in front of her shoulders? That you said she cannot kick over her bridge gives me an indication that she either hasn’t yet fully understood the concept of stacking (shoulders over wrists, hips over shoulders and so on) or that she doesn’t yet have the shoulder flexibility to do so. Without being able to get up again from a bridge and if the bridge isn’t tight and stacked she has no chance of executing a front walkover and if she can’t do a backbend to bridge from one foot then she isn’t going to be able to do a proper connected back walkover. These are strength and flexibility skills that require many hours of conditioning and perseverance, some children do just naturally have a good physique for acro, but strength, strength, strength is the key- it’s not just about being able to do these skills, it’s about being able to do them safely. Acrodance is not gymnastics and a theatre stage or dance floor is not forgiving if you fall, so these skills should all be executed very competently on the mat before being progressed to the floor / included in dance routines. All too often I have seen children throw a terrifying back handspring in a festival routine with bent arms, bent legs and massive undercut just because they can, or a scaerial where they hurl themselves head over heels with their head dangerously close to the floor and no proper arm and driving leg use to give them any uplift. Patience, conditioning and practice is your answer- there is no magical formula or shortcut! (though it’s not what most people want to hear).

*tight not tug

Sounds like quite a pushy dance school to me, honestly speaking. She shouldn't be getting upset about it in my view.

DD was rubbish at acro but it didn't hold her back in any way. In any case most kids couldn't do an aerial at 7 as far as I can recall.

Yes, she does Acro at dance, but only once a week, which isn’t really enough, so we need to do more at home. They don’t do private Acro lessons because the teacher doesn’t have any availability for this school. Her teacher doesn’t seem too worried and thinks song and dance will be more her ‘thing’ but dd wants to get better at acro, which is commendable, so I want to try and help her. Yes, it’s a lot of dance, but that doesn’t really worry me. She absolutely loves it. It’s hard to explain to people who are not involved in competitive dance, I know it sounds crazy from the outside, but it’s quite normal - well at her school at least.

if she is a serious competitive dancer then I would speak to the teacher and ask for a list of strengthening stuff she can do at home, this should be safe strength building and flexibility exercises that she can do easily herself or with your supervision- no tumbling or forced stretches. If the teacher can see she is keen I’m sure she would be happy to help. If done regularly this should help. The biggest issue I see as a teacher though is children wanting to skip the conditioning at home because it’s boring then not understanding why they aren’t building strength. It has to come from your child though and be something she wants to do and not be something she has to do, otherwise her dance will become a chore and no longer enjoyable.

I know it's normal at a lot of schools, but I don't necessarily think that means it's healthy. It sounds like the kind of school where there is a lot of pressure. It's fine if your dd is happy, but if she is starting to get upset about not keeping up with her peers in certain areas, I would be keeping an eye on it personally and considering whether to move to a more chilled environment.

Yes normal at your school doesn't necessarily mean healthy.

I had competitive swimmers and gymnasts/now trampoline so understand about lots of hours. But if you're in it for the long game then you need not to peak at 9 and crash. 6 days a week at 7 is genuinely a lot. People aren't saying this because they "don't understand " but because they've been in the competitive world and know.

Competitive gymnasts do a lot of hours and are known for it. But even they don't do 6 days a week at 7 round here. And this is elite level/send a couple to Olympics type club. (We left that club due to pressure and joined a less pressured Club, but still wasn't 6 days at 7!)

I don’t know much about dance but the competitive gymnasts will be doing 6ish hours a week at this age (the year they turn 7) not 6 days a week.

Are others in her class struggling with the skills as well or is it just when compared to other dance schools? In gym they don’t tend to teach back bends and walkovers before say age 5 as they don’t want them damaging their necks. Also you see cheerleaders doing back walkovers, flips etc. with what gymnasts (and probably dancers too) would think of as not great technique.

can you talk to her teacher about where the issue is? My dd is hyper mobile (can easily do over splits etc), but has a stiff back. This kind of issue isn’t uncommon with hyper mobility. Dd had to work a bit on her back flexibility to get back walkovers.

It’s not always 6 days. It has been for the last few weeks with comps etc, it is always 4, sometimes 5, depending on when her solo lesson is.
@dancinfeet thanks very much, your comments are really helpful. She does 2 stretch classes a week and one body con class. We stretch at home, but don’t really do conditioning so that’s something we could definitely look into. Her bridge position is good. When she drops back it is fairly controlled (maybe a bit less so near the ground) she doesn’t really ‘flop’ but she does need to readjust her position once she’s down. She can kick over from a raised surface, but not the floor. I don’t think she can stand back up from bridge, well I’ve never asked her or seen her do it anyway.

Theres a group of 4 of them in the comp team who are 7 and they’re the youngest. Dd is probably the worst (or second to worst) at acro. The others can things like hold a handstand, drop back then bridge kick over, backwards walkover. The 8 year olds can do things like ariels. Plus at comps you see quite a few in her age category that can do these things.

Does it matter that kids older than her at comps can do more?

It does sound like you're moving into pushy-parent territory. Again long haul- it all becomes super hard if she stops enjoying it, or is feeling lots of pressure at 7 to be somewhere you want her to be.

She is asking me to help and wants to get better. If she wanted to stop, she could (and I’d be much richer for it 😂) Her age group is Section A (age 7-8) so she is competing against them. She wants to win 🤷🏻‍♀️ I’m not making her do anything.

It’s really hard to speak to her acro teacher because she’s a specialist they bring in so I don’t really see her. I think we’ll work on strength and conditioning as @dancinfeet suggested and see how we get on.

That's all fair enough, OP, but I still think that the atmosphere sounds unhealthy for a 7yo. I know a lot of kids who attended this kind of school, and it was fine at that age. Not so fine for some of them as they got older, unfortunately.

Just keep an eye. Activities like dance should make your child happy. It's fine to struggle and strive, and doing stuff that they find difficult can be a great way of learning the value of hard work, practice and perseverance, but if the child is starting to get upset about stuff, that would be a cause for concern for me.

My daughter went to a full time dance school and trained at a professional college and cannot do any acro tricks at all.

I wouldn't worry.

Training 6 days a week plus at home and stressing over not being as good as the others at 7 years old means that she will have given up by 11.

And I say this as a parent of 2 national level athletes.

And apologies, but having a parent who is so concerned they are posting about it on the internet won't help either.

It sounds to me like she is doing a lot for 7! My daughter does acro at her dance school and has only just moved on to one-handed cartwheels at almost 9. She needs to move at the right pace for her body or she will get injured.