Viv

This if off topic, and possibly a little ranty, but this is my 2 cents... I'll just point out that for these Aussie students wanting to win a place (and finance) at a school like Royal Ballet or Elmhurst or really any of the upper schools in the UK, competitions like this are seen as the 'only chance'. In fact, many of the 'full time' dance studio programs deliberately teach both RAD and cecchetti to make their students eligible for the most competitions possible! If you think about it, it's not like a student from down under can casually fly to England a couple times to audition for ballet schools. There's not really a comparative 'upper school' system that I know of in Australia, students tend to dance full time at a 'local studio' and do distance or online schooling until they're university age, then do a degree in dance. For the serious kids who have the same aspirations to attend upper schools as British students do, the pressure is on to qualify and make the finals at one of these competitions and be noticed by a big international school (particularly for the girls). I'm not saying I agree with the system or the amount of pressure placed on our young people, but this might be why the Australian's are on average younger than the brits? I'd say most of them aren't at 'normal' academic schools. The majority probably train full time at a studio either in conjunction with a part time course-load at a participating school or through online education programs/homeschooling.

I quite enjoy doing the syllabus to live piano. My teacher arranges 'live music' rehearsals a month before the exam with the pianist we'll use on exam days. It's a great day, not only does the candidate get to experience dancing to live music but the pianist works with the dancer to make them look their best. I remember last year adjusting one of the grade 5 exercises to be slower for a group of very tall girls than it was for the much shorter girls. Having more time meant the tall girls could gather all their limbs and extend them beautifully...It was wonderful! And I think a wonderful experience to learn how the dancer works with the musician to together create something special. And I think it makes the exams feel kind of nice and important if you don't normally get to dance with live music. Unfortunately, the piano at my studio is...well, crap. I feel sorry for the accompanist because you can see her physically wincing when she tries to play and the keys don't strike or the tuning is out. It's quite punishing to dance to at times and can throw you off but I'm sure the examiner takes that into account. We can't afford a new piano so I guess we must muddle through!

Not too late, I won't take them until October (unsure of exact dates yet) I'm not sure why exactly why teacher is able to enter me into two exams on the same day, it's an exam at the teachers own studio though if that potentially makes a difference. Some girls are even doing three exams in one session (two vocational and one graded)! This year we're having all ballet exams at the same time as no one was ready for the only other session in my region (July), so everyone at my studio from pre-primary through to Advanced 1 have exams in the same three days. Incidentally, another school may be joining with us for these exams making the exams push out to four days and therefore I may not have to do two exams on one day afterall! But they're still within the same 'session'. This is not the first year my teacher has done it either. I know someone who last year took Grade 8 one day and Advanced Foundation the next day without any cause for concern. Again it was at the teachers studio and not at an RAD hosted venue. You may have seen I'm in Australia which may make things a little different, but I'd be surprised if RAD run things differently between countries. Of course, because of where I live if you miss the October session you would need to fly 5 hours to the other side of the country to sit a different session which may make them more amenable to two exams at once. Another factor that might be taken into account is that my teacher is an examiner? Not sure what that would change but helpful to have all the factors that could be in the mix... But if none of that applies, it may simply be that that's the rule of your DD's teacher rather than an RAD specific rule

I have to say so far I'm pretty impressed with the nike bags, especially considering the prices. If it holds up well with pretty much daily use, seems like very good value. Definitely going to take a closer at these

I'm definitely thinking a sports bag is the way to go, that Nike sounds perfect! Do you happen to know which one it was? I might have to go to a general sports store and have a look around. I'm finding Wednesdays particularly challenging, going straight from uni to dancing so having textbooks and laptop plus different uniforms for each class, different shoes, different skirts... I like the look of some of the Under Armour ones because they come with laptop pockets, but I'd need to win lotto first

I was actually just looking at the Under Armour bags yesterday! Good to hear they hold up well. Do you know which one your DD has specifically? I also have bags within bags (pointe shoe bag, technique shoe bag, non-ballet shoe bag, character bag, scarf-and-skirt bag...) so it may work out nicely for me haha.

I've looked at general gym bags as well but would still like to hear some reviews of them used for dance bags if anyone has them I tend to do most of research online but half the bags don't even have pictures of the inside, makes it hard to make a good assessment. Not sure about mnemo but I have no preference for a dance brand bag, anything that fits it all in will do! But if anyone here has found a bag, of any kind, particularly good, it would be nice to hear about it

Mmm I'm glad someone asked this, a lot of the threads on dance bags seem to be from a few years ago and are a little out of date. Plus the pictures put online are normally less than ideal. I am looking to purchase a new bag myself However, I'm slightly paranoid about water bottles spilling and pulling out a pair of sodden, mushy pointe shoes, the look of horror on my teachers face, the 'ka-ching' noise in my head when I think of trying to afford a replacement pair... With that in mind, do any of these bags have a waterproof pocket or something? Has anyone (or their DC) had a problem with leakage?

That sort of cross training sounds ideal, if only I didn't have to balance with the full time postgraduate study, work, internships and 7 hours dancing a week already... I think if anything I can stand the intensity, maybe (hopefully!) but the long break in between is going to be killer. All that time for lactic acid to build up! I'm thinking I may live on the foam roller. I'm a little concerned about stretching because all the research seems to say that leads to a drop in strength for several hours afterwards and I'd hate to have that happen. Oh and I just remembered! I was going to sew my undergarments into my exam leotard, but I wear different leotards for each level so I guess I'll spend some of my time ripping out the stitches and sewing it back into the new leotard. Or get two and pre-sew them. Great tip about the food though, I hadn't even thought about the impact of going into a 2:30pm exam full, sleepy and probably slightly bloated. Just what you want right?

Help! I've been entered for two exams on the same day! I have Grade 6 first thing in the morning and then IF at around 2:30pm. I'm so worried, if I throw everything I have into Grade 6 then I'll be physically dead for IF, and IF is definitely my priority. Any words of advice? How to go all out for an hour, sit around for 5 hours, and then go all out again in IF which is already incredibly physically draining? On a different subject, my teacher has decided to make the dreadfully difficult Allegro 2 even harder because this week we've been doing all allegro in pointe shoes... She's trying to beat the sound out of them and increase our awareness of our feet but it's so horrible to do hahaha. My shoes are mostly dead by now so it's astonishing how hard it still is to articulate in a glissade.

I'll be damned...No one in my area stocks Energetiks so I'll have to wait till I'm somewhere with more dance shops, but I spoke to a fitter recently who thinks Energetiks could be good for me (they have some that are nice and skinny apparently). Considering all those 'fit your own shoe' websites put me in russian pointe, I'm starting to see a connection. I'll still wait for a proper fitting, though my future holidays are starting to look less like relaxing and more like stocking up on ballet essentials when I get the chance. Didn't know Just Ballet shipped internationally but now I know they do I'm very intrigued. Also, just collected my first pair of MDM. They feel very strange, quite lifted in the heel, but I'll give them a few classes to wear in before making a ruling

I'm always so nervous buying shoes online because I've got funny shaped feet... Also hate paying the same amount in shipping as I did for the item being shipped (tried to buy a couple of tshirts from the US the other day, retail price $30, plus $80 shipping!) Don't see what else I can do though when shoes are being held for ransom in the southern hemisphere. It seems a bit of a rip when so many dancewear and shoe company's originate down under and then blow a big raspberry in the face of their own country. And I agree with you about not being happy with pointe fittings, the advice always seems to be 'go somewhere with a wide range and try on everything' but every shop here seems to have sold its soul to be given the pleasure of selling one style of one brand of shoe. And then we pay twice the price for the privilege. ...you're not meaning to tell me that russian pointe and energetiks are the same ruddy thing are you? I've been trying to locate russian pointe for about a year and I buy from energetiks regularly! Maybe the other bloch shoes I'm looking for have been here all along under an alias

Thank you for your reply Cara, you reminded me to call the dance shop and check on whether any shoes in my size arrived in their latest order! Hopefully when I try the MDM in my size I will be slightly more enamoured with them, otherwise it's the suspiciously squishy juliets for me... I'm still liking the hanamis though I find the left foot tends to slip a bit in pirouettes so I'm turning half on a suede patch and half on canvas. Haven't heard of the capezio cobras before though that's hardly surprising, I've heard from some shop owners around here that they are deliberately restricted in the stock they can carry. One shop stocking bloch is (allegedly) only ever sent prolite ii to sell, not even given the option to purchase other styles, no matter what... #shoespiracy Now I'm just frustrated that our friends across the Tasman are getting the short end of the stick too! In my imagination I see Sydney and Melbourne swimming in a sea of ballet shoes...leather, stretch canvas, neoprene, sansha, grishko, capezio...I could weep. Now, if you fellas got an inferior brand of rugby apparel I wouldn't mind as much because that would just be levelling the playing field

I went to a new dance shops on Monday and allowed myself to be talked into the Hanami by Capezio (canvas). I love them! They're like wearing a sock and there's no bunching around the toes or arch. I did not pick up a new pair of leathers as I didn't take to the Juliet (very squishy lining?) and there were no MDM in my size. I think when there are though, I will go with the MDM which felt very weird but will hopefully help rehabilitate my injured and weak ankle.

I know the first lecture of every semester at uni will start with 'this is the toughest subject you will ever do at law school'...

I have to say, I don't think the mark required to get a certain grade necessarily indicates whether a course is harder or not. In my experience it's generally been the opposite. At my high school in Australia I put in a lot of work, studied hard, and I was lucky to receive mostly Bs with occassional As. The cut off for an A was 75% and considered very difficult to achieve. When I went to high school in Canada, I put in zero effort whatsoever and my lowest mark was 93%... But the cut-off for an A there was 86! Because the academic rigour was in my opinion not as high (though this is subject to a LOT of caveats and qualifications), far more people were able to achieve above 86% in Canada and therefore get an A. The same students, if judged by the standards of my Australian school, would have been performing at the same level but would have received a lower percentage mark. Not because the course was harder or the other students were smarter, just because one smart cookie decided that a good mark was 75 rather than 86. It's all rather meaningless when you look at it that way. As Pictures has already posted the grade categories for RAD, this post was just trying to give a little anecdotal evidence on the general insignificance of number grades hahaha Percentages and grades are entirely arbitrary, they have meaning only in relation to other students within the same syllabus or as judged against several independent and external criteria. I am not familiar with AAD but I am sure it's just another way of training a child to the best of their ability, as equally valid as any other method. AAD or RAD or anything else doesn't really matter as long as your DD is supported and challenged and happy Though whether your DD is disappointed or ecstatic with her final RAD grade compared to her previous AAD grades, it might do to keep this discussion in mind.

I think I got them wider than I needed them at the time because otherwise I couldn't spread my toes on demi and the corresponding effect is a wrinkly arch. I'm perhaps being a bit unkind to the prolite ii, they're very durable and I've only started having aesthetic concerns recently (now they're on their last legs). Im also wondering if my feet may have changed slightly? I got these shoes 3 years ago (dancing once a week in recreational beginners classes), changed to full soles when I started at my current studio last year (2 days a week) and only fished out these split soles again when I got a hole in my toe a few days before the exam last October. Now I dance 5 days a week, have progressed to pointe and generally have strengthened and stretched my feet. Is it possible these shoes were a good fit once and my feet have just...changed?

My teacher is very clear with all of us that if we can't commit to classes, we will not be doing the exam. Vocational RAD is not for everyone and if you can't come to the classes, you will not be ready for the exam in the way you need to be. However, she is very flexible within that position to enable as many people to dance as possible. A girl in my class has ballet clash with tap once a week. She does 2 classes of IF and a class of Intermediate every week to make up the required hours, as long as she's getting enough technique classes and understands the exam material, she doesn't need to do all IF classes. Another in IF has no intention of doing exams because she doesn't want to be a ballet dancer professionally, but she loves ballet and wants to increase her technique. She comes to class twice a week (was once a week but she decided to increase it this term) with the understanding that she will work hard but will not be entered for the exam. She has been in IF for 2 years and will probably move up to Intermediate with us next year even without an exam result. My teacher wants everyone to dance, and everyone to dance to a hi standard. You can do as many classes a week as you want, but you have to understand that if you're not committing the same hours of work as the others in the class you may not be entered for the exam, or you may take longer to be ready than those who are doing more, or you may have no intention of doing the exam at all! All are fine. I don't see why the same shouldn't be true for adults. Exams are a lovely goal to work towards, I feel like they cement my readiness to move up, and they're one more chance to perform to an audience (the examiner haha). But exams are not the reason I do ballet, if I wasn't feeling it then I would probably still do syllabus work (it really does make more sense to my brain and learning style than open class) I'd just save an extra hundred bucks a year hahaha. I really do need to learn to be more succinct and stop writing essays as replies...

Has anyone heard of/tried MDM Dancewear? They came up on the website of one of the local shops I'm going to try. They seem to have created a shoe with almost an orthotic in it, full sole on the inside and split on the outside. The aim is to prevent injury by supporting the foot more than the typical ballet slipper, and also increase strength by adding resistance. Not sure if I quite buy it, seems a rather ambitious goal for an insole. Would love to hear any opinions on this shoe. I've found very few reviews, some saying it supports their arch and gives a lovely line and others saying it was uncomfortable and ugly (though I think you'd get that with any shoe)

In leather split sole? Bloch Prolite II. That's all. Individual stockists may have more range but I've been to most dance stores in my city and it's bloch prolite ii (this is what I'm wearing currently that is so unflattering). On the Australian online store it's bloch prolite ii. If I could get to Sydney and go to the main store there may be more options but it's not feasible for me to get there, and there's no guarantee they'd carry any stock that's not available in the online store. I am planning my dream trip to England and Europe, hopefully at the end of next year, and oh the dancewear stores I'll visit!

Sounds perfect Moomin, if only bloch sold them in their country of origin... You may be noticing something of a pattern here hahaha. I think I may have to use my current size information and try ordering online, and pay the astronomical 'Australia' tax that comes with it. I'll just add it to the pile of money I burn every month (or at least that's what it feels like when my class fees come out!)

I have done both open classes, syllabus classes without the exam pressure, and exam oriented classes. I know for me personally my technique has improved dramatically through the goal of working towards the exam. I think it depends on the individual, I find I struggle to self motivate and tend to slack off if left to my own devices... I don't realise I'm doing it, I genuinely think I'm working hard, but without my current exam teacher giving me her razor eyed stare and simply saying 'foot' I would really think that I was pointing as hard as I could, until I point harder and realise I was slacking hahaha. If I could get my teacher doing non-syllabus classes maybe I'd get the same benefit, though I find what I benefit from most is repetition, clear guide lines in when to move forward and what is appropriate for the level I'm at. In the holidays I look forward to open classes because I can push myself to remember combinations, try things I don't get to do in syllabus and learn some of the quirks of different teachers. But at the end of it all, I look forward to going back to my syllabus classes. It's where I make the most progress. Not everyone will be the same, but that's why I do exams Conversely, I have a different teacher for grade 6 and I'm completely unmotivated at the moment We spend the whole class just going over the steps and not learning how to dance, never getting corrections just being told that we're doing the steps wrong. This is not why I do ballet. Also the teacher isn't 100% sure of the syllabus so she's teaching it to herself at the same time she's teaching it to us. I've found that since I lack the motivation in that class, I don't want to do the exam anymore because it's no longer something that's pushing me (and why would I spend $100 on showcasing that I don't know the exercises and make a complete fool of myself?)

Perhaps you could approach it by asking the teacher when they think you will be ready to sit the exam, based on your progress so far. That will let them know that you'd be interested in doing the exam, which they may not have realised, and also provide an opportunity for you to see what your teacher sees as areas of concern (which may or may not include your attendance). She may say you'll never be ready, and then you'll need to assess whether working towards an exam is something you value above the teachers opinion. Really, however you go about it you just have to ask. At my studio the vocational grades are done by invitation, those who aren't invited after grade 4 or 5 continue in the graded syllabus. After completing grade 5 I wasn't invited to join and I agonised over it for weeks, thinking she didn't think I was good enough or that I was wasting my time with all this ballet nonsense. Turns out she had no idea I was even interested and once I asked her 'what do I need to do in order to be considered for next year' she basically told me to stop being ridiculous and start immediately (literally immediately, my first class was 5 minutes after our conversation!) I think you can be invigorated by doing the exam at any age It gives you a concrete goal to work towards, and I find that I push myself harder (and get pushed harder by my teacher) with the exam on the horizon. Just ask Whichever way you do it will be the right way.

Thanks for the advice TooTu, if I go for the so danca's I'll keep it in mind. I normally really do like bloch, so if I can stay with them I probably will. Not too happy just at the moment though, I ended up going on the bloch website to have a look at the neohybrid and there's about 7 different types of leather split soles available in America, compared to the 2 types you can get in Australia...considering they're headquartered in Sydney it's a bit of a joke that an Australian company offers so little choice here. Not impressed. Thanks for the suggestion CeliB, unfortunately my teacher does insist that for exam classes we wear leather shoes (and she has only recently relented on allowing us split soles!) but I will keep grishko in mind for my next pair of canvas flats

From a quick look around, it appears that bloch s0259L is available in the US and the UK but not in Aus, which is a bit confusing to me. It also looks like So Danca is not sold in stores here. Looks like I am venturing into the wonderful world of buying shoes online! How hard can it be... Thanks for the suggestions, I like the idea of a different material under the arch, and I'm sure my teacher will be fine with it as long as she THINKS it's all leather What she doesn't know can't hurt her...