MumToTu

When dd was in Junior Associates, her (state) primary headteacher marked ballet absences as Educational Visits, so as not to effect any of her attendance records. It doesn't take many absences to send them over and receive a awful attendance letter from the council, my son received one after only 4 days of at right at the beginning of the school year with a stomach bug and he wanted to make sure that didn't happen down to her when she was off school working hard at her ballet! Apparently the council send them out not the school. Mind you, she did associate on a Friday so it was really relevant. The secondary school she is at now is private, so it's so much easier. Though, I think they mark them as authorised absences, although they do this for their own school trips and residentials too.

Yes, schools are incredibly different in their attitudes. At dds primary school they allowed medals or certificates into morning worship to be presented to children with a huge round of applause and well done from the head teacher. The headteacher was very supportive of her doing JAs on Fridays and allowed her all the time off she needed, and even now asks me about her and her dancing. However, her class teacher didn't understand at all and used to get a bit confused and think she was going for loads of ballet exams and get a really grumpy. At her secondary school they have an achievement board in reception which are they are positively encouraged to use. My dd finally plucked up the courage to bring in a picture of herself at her final RBS MA class of the year and the school asked my permission to do a feature on dds ballet in the September school magazine and on their website too. She was over the moon and I think it's has given her a huge boost of confidence. I just wish I had some lovely professional shots of her to give them ! So, yes schools and infact different staff in schools, can have very different attitudes. I would just carry on regardless and well done to your dd!!

Yes, you can't always judge a book by its cover ! I love the fact she's feisty. I should really rephrase the tacking for trying to get the ball, I am getting mixed up with football, I knew very little about basketball. Also, we live in the centre of Manchester and sometimes the more boisterous boys on sports teams can *ahem* play a bit on the rough side !

Yes, I was not happy with her! and had to carry her into A & E, thankfully after primary school age children are banned from playing against the opposite sex well at least while they are in primary school league competitions anyway. Some of the boys were huge on the opposite team and played as a hobby and she was terrible at basketball, but far to feisty and trying so hard to win. I had told her too I didn't want her playing in the school team, but she begged and cried, I think it finally taught her a lesson, if she wants to dance, she can't play contact sports and she's never asked again to join a team strangely enough!

Sports day is the highlight of my dds acedemic year. She even wants to go back to watch her old primary schools sports day this year. She came first in her year at high jump the other day, and loves athletics, any sport really even the ones she's bad at! Her idea of "fun" is watching football on tv, she has an obsession with sports and I even had to tell her off for joining a football forum, she literally knows everything about every player it's crazy. She does not get this from me, I was always the child told off for purposely forgetting my PE kit at school, watching team sports to me is like watching paint dry..! She has often injured herself at sport, a broken arm at gymnastics falling off the beam, badly sprained ankle playing basketball at school, after she got really stuck in tackling a boy and got knocked flying, injured knee somersaulting into a vault at gymnastics, and sprained knee being accidentally kicked playing football, requiring me to pay for her physio!! I think I can safely say she's a bit of a tomboy...! You'd never think it to look at her in a ballet class though...!

Yes, just amazing !! dd absolutely loves it! She is just about to finish her 2nd term there, so quite new too, I will ask her to introduce herself if she hadn't already! I'll look out for you, blonde mum usually with my very lively 9 year son ? In tow..!

Congratulations RichieN, my dd is going into Manchester Mid Y8 and grade 5 at CP too!! They must know each other surely. Such a beautiful dance school. Look forward to meeting you soon I expect your dd is very excited!

That's very enlightening!! Thank you for explaining! Gymnastics is a fantastic foundation sport as it trains everything strength, flexibility, explosiveness, balance. But, I don't think it would be worth attending to compliment ballet flexibility, as more time would probably be spent practising hand stands and conditioning lol! Not to mention they don't encourage working turnout. My dd attended a Rhythmic Gymnastics club before she switched to artistic and it was the coach there who told her artistic gymnastics would make her muscles shorter as they do more strengh and plyo training I mean a lot, you have to be super super strong! And it would effect her long lean elegent appearance, they preferred invisable muscles and ordered her to stop attending her artistic class, if she wanted to continue in the sport, as she would build the wrong body shape. The two disciplines are like chalk and cheese!! Totally different! What a talented young lady this Audrey Freeman is! rhythmic gymnastics is a very elegent sport! I wonder if she is going become a professional ballerina eventually...! She should she would be so amazing.

Yes, not to mention the time commitment involved! My dd was a competitive artistic gymnast until the age of 11, 20 plus hours a week commitment! Dd didn't do much flexibility work in gymnastics, though naturally flexible children would tend to be good at it. They typically only stretched 5 minutes after a training session to cool down. A lot more empathsis was placed on shoulder flexibility in bridges etc than leg flexibilty anyway as it is very much an upper body sport, and this protects the lower back being over worked in walkovers etc. It always amazed me how some of the least flexible stronger gymnasts who were miles of all their splits had the best splits in leaps! How does that work?!? So, I don't really think it would benefit flexibility at all if anything it could hinder it especally if you were the type of person who is naturally tight, as a lot of strengthening work is done rather than lengthening the muscles, you could get less flexible! Plus, the posture and they don't turn out like Kate N said is really different, and it would be undoing a lot of work a ballet teacher was trying to achieve! Unless you are talking about rhythmic gymnastics! That's a totally different story. That may help flexibility a lot as they spend hours just stretching and it is all about flexibility, but it's not that common a sport at all in this country really so you may struggle to find a club depending on where you live. I think this may help with ballet as it more similar and its more like a type of dance.

This is really interesting, my Dh was only telling me last night, how one of the most talented footballers in the world Messi was spotted for his amazing potential at a young age, but had a rare form of dwarfism, so was would be destined to be far too small to make a professional career from it as he would barely make 5 foot tall as an adult. The club paid and successfully treated him with a growth hormone treatment and he grew to be very tall 5 foot 7!! Although you can still see Dh said it affected his body proportions and he still has very short limbs. Sorry to take off subject, I just found it an amazingly inspirational story!

I am sure you are perfect the way you are as god made you and have no need to worry about growing !! If you are worried at all you could ask your mum to take you to see your GP to set your mind at rest. I remember my mum taking me to the GP as I was very underweight, pale and very skinny, due to fussy eating, as a child, and him advising her to encourage me eat whatever I liked, ie chocolates , sugary fizzy drinks etc, whenever I felt like it! not sure this was great advice as I now have a really sweet tooth and am discovering I can no longer burn it off as quickly in my 40s!! Remember too you need to eat more if you are exercising. My dd is always hungry and eats like a horse. She likes carbs before dancing ie pasta pesto etc otherwise she experiences energy dips. I give her proteins after for muscle recovery a habit we've got into since she did gymnastics. And plenty of fruit to snack on bananas, dried mango, protein bars are good. I don't think 2 pieces of chocolate a day would make that much of a difference to you growing, although a nice treat ! maybe also adding more calories with healthy carbs ie oats flatjack, porridge , milkshakes, smoothies. I am sure if you eat fewer calories then you burn off it could delay growth, but you would have to be doing a lot of training 30 hours a week or so and or be on a very strict diet !! Which I am sure you are not!! Just checking your mum knows you post on a public forum as you are although sounding very mature still only 14!? She maybe the best person to advice you as she knows exactly your height and weight and what you are eating X

I am no expert, but my sister in law is a chiropodist and she said children in her opinion shouldn't go En Pointe, before the growth plates on feet have started to fuse around age 12ish, unless they are prepared risk chronic Injury in later life as the bones are still so soft. Are you sure the younger children aren't going to be getting soft blocks maybe? My dd got soft blocks age 11-12. I have never seen a child in pointe shoes age 8, it seems a bit young to me to take the risk even if small, you need a healthy body for the rest of your life, even if you choose not to dance! Just my humble opinion though of though of course !

Would you be able to ask your teacher for a 10 minute appointment at a convenient time for her maybe ? And take at least one of your parents, write a list of questions to ask especially regarding your dance school helping you prepare for auditioning at age 16. Maybe ask her advice on the best route she thinks you should take and some kind of plan for progress. This could help reassure you whether or not are moving forward in the right direction and give you something to reflect on with your family?

Is the private lesson working towards anything i.e. an exam. If your teacher can't accommodate more than a half an hour a week private, could she recommend a teacher who could give you an hour private a week alongside your dance school training, to compliment it, does she know of your aspirations?

Maybe you could request private lessons at your current dance school? Once or twice a week? Would that be a possibility?

I might add to clarify her old dance school could only offer limited classes, so I have moved her to Centrepointe and she now dances more and is extremely happy. The perils of iPhone typing!! Centrpointe offer all she needs in a pre vocational dance school, in beautiful premises. We tried topping up dds local dance school as we really liked her teacher before moving, but it just became so messy when classes move up, confusing for dd etc X

Good luck, I would highly recommend Centrepointe in Manchester. My Dd younger yhan you 12 and is very serious about ballet, and her dance school could only offer 3 1/2 hours (albeit amazing) ballet in term time. And she was desperate to dance more and for full her absolute potential. she is extremely happy there, a lot more classes and pointeeork, shows, conditioning everything she could ask for and more, she has been introduced to new dance genres such as contemporary. Feel free to PM me or they have an excellent website xxx

Congratulations, what an amazing achievement! Well done and enjoy SAs!

Thank you mph, that makes sense, she said she would like them to blend in perfectly with her tights, a nice project for the Easter holidays I think..!

I believe the Freed store in London can custom make shoes if you are lucky enough to live near to London. We were fortunate to have a visit from a Freeds fitter at a workshop, and it was just so informative! , we are definitely going to pay Freeds a visit for a fit, if we are in London at some point. The Vagnovas sound a great option, dd didn't try those, just the 2007s. She has long toes too and the vamp is long they are lovely shoes and look stunning on. She has been talking of calomining them, not quite sure what she means by this or the purpose of it...!

Ha ha, my dd has Grishko 2007 too, she has a narrow foot width fitting X, and a very high instep and arch, I think this is a bendy foot? They fit her so well, she's never needed any toe pads. We were told to try Freeds by various people who really rate freeds, but the fitter said she'll go through them too quick, as she has the sort of feet which need a harder shoe as she'll break her shoes in really quickly! And it could get expensive, so I was immediately sold too...! She also had tapered toes, which these shoes suit apparently. Anyway, she's got on great with them, in a medium shank for her first pair, still going strong after 4 month's wear now.

Thank you Xanthe, I don't if this may help, but physio told her to maintain her stretches especially during growth spurts, I am sure very safe for anyone to do, they were :- Stand on a stair with just her heels off the end and slowly raise her heel below stair level up and down 3 times a day if possible. Also, to stand facing a wall with one foot against it and put her other foot flat on the floor behind it as far as she can and feel a gentle stretch. The physio treatments are fabulous! So, great help is out there if does strike. Hoping your dd stays pain free ! Truely painful, horrible condition for an active child! I have read high impact sports can be a real trigger, so I keep her away from hockey and cross country racing clubs etc at school now. I am sure a good physio will sort her out a preventative plan and fingers crossed! Well done for being one step ahead...!

Hi Xanthe, my dd suffered from this a year ago thankfully over school holidays, but she suffered a lot of pain, at the time she was training a lot of gymnastics 16 hours maybe more a week before a comp and her coach had to pulled her out and advised a prompt visit to a physio as she couldnt run withou bring it in agony! Let alone land off a vault etc. Of course she never told me, as she hated missing practise! We asked our GP to refer her through our BUPA, who found a her a local physio. As we needed one we could travel to easily, but couldn't have helped with dancer assessment though....! but BUPA did say we could pick our own and are totally flexible. She advised total rest, strictly no ballet or gymnastics, thankfully it was over Christmas anyway and was given twice weekly follow up physio assessments/treatments for 3 weeks until 100 percent recovered. Ankle stretches to do 3 times a day, standing on stairs lifting her heels up and down etc. Plus she advised temporarily wearing heel cups in her shoes. You can buy them online. And as quickly as it came on it went. She had stiff Achilles for a while after I noticed she couldn't do the yoga position downward dog etc at all!, which made me laugh as my Achilles are really loose! And she's really simular to me in her legs. Complete rest off activities was the hardest thing for my dd..! She was mortified at the idea. Though thankfully, it sounds like a mild case compared to your Xanthe! She was never in a cast thankfully ! As quickly as it comes on it goes thankfully, it seems to coincide with her pre teen growth spurt and she too has really longs legs, high arches and very slim delicate ankles, so no muscle fat around the Achilles the physio said to protect it. She's also tall, so growth spurts are probably bigger too, so the ligaments can get really stretched as they need time to catch up. Wishing your dd a speedy recovery. My dd really enjoyed the fuss of having a physio, and keep begging me to let her have a sports massages, which she didn't need she just liked the idea..!

That's interesting MAK but dd's feet are the opposite and i think maybe more prone to subinate, though i dont know if she does or not, ie when she pushes or relaxes back into her hyperextension her knees face inwards rather than just back and look bandy... from the front and I would assume her feet may follow this curved shape too, lol i am not painting a good picture, am I sorry dd...! It's hard getting them out of gymnastics once they've got the bug isn't it. I don't think has helped dds posture either. I am glad your dd is improving, i think my dd is too a lot since she "retired" lol age 11, but slowly too.

Hi dancer 123, I like you was concerned about turnout when my dd was the same age. I noticed at the barre in her class she was hardly turning her feet out at all and could not understand why. It was that bad even i noticed it and despite her having completely flat box splits at that time. In fact it still confuses me a bit but I have never studied ballet and am easily confused I don't know if her being constantly told at gymnastics to keep her feet completely parallel for landings on beam, tumbling etc didn't help....! And she never practised any butterfly type type stretches. Training gymnastics is not ideal, for ballet we have since learned. She too, like you say your dd has been until recently, only taking one grade 2 ballet class a week. She did practise her splits at gymnastics though. 3 years on after a lot more practise she looks turned out at the barre now, so i had no reason to even worry! This happened very gradually and she's always been ridiculously strict with herself not cheat, too strict i think sometimes...she's very conscious about never injuring herself, so probuably worked the right muscles etc, so she can hold it in the centre with her leg out in 90 really well, well this is according to her reports anyway!! So, you have to trust the process it will come. Maybe your dds teacher knows she could turnout more? but is having to remind her in class at barre to use her full capicity? she might not understand it's importance and realise she's not turning out. I am sure a teacher wouldn't be telling her to turnout more if there was a physical reason she couldn't? Good luck at the physio I am sure she doesnt have restricted turnout if her teacher says she's fine in stretches! she hopefully though lack of experience hadn't learnt how to use it properly yet, it is a very slow process and I can imagine it takes years to master fully... It's not easy being a non dancing mum is it with non dancing lively younger siblings in tow can sympathise there too