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JA Auditions... flexibility


JupiterSmith

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My daughter is auditioning for the JA's this year. 

My sister previously auditioned and was asked to demonstrate her flexibility. Box splits etc. 

Has anyone else's child experienced the audition? I was just wondering what sort of things they will be asked to do. 

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My daughter will be auditioning this Friday. I can let you know after if you would like? My daughter can't do the box splits yet, so I hope not. I was told they do lots of different stretches and maybe froggies on their back? It is a minefield. Hopefully somebody who auditioned today in Newcastle might be able to give us some insight? 

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1 hour ago, Selby1974 said:

 

My daughter will be auditioning this Friday.

 

See you at Dartington on Friday 😊. 

 

If they do do stretches I would guess it will be at the end of the class when everyone is nice and warm and a bit stretchier. I didn’t think DD could do box splits then I saw her sat in them at then end of her class recently! Gave me a surprise!! 

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I really don't know what they are looking for? My daughter's ballet teacher says that a lot of it is body type? But i'm guessing that if they all have the body type then it will be based on musicality, poise and flexibility which means they will be doing stretches. probably similar to the JA experience day they did last year. I know they definitely look at their bare feet too. Who knows?

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Friends of my DD who haven't got full box splits and struggled with other stretches have been shortlisted for JAs and then given MA places so it's not the be all and end all. In contrast DD has been down in all three splits since age 7, danced for London Children's Ballet and got a vocational school place - yet we've amassed a lovely collection of RBS 'no" emails over the years :) . I've known girls both tall and small offered JAs, the only thing I can see that they had in common was that they had a certain something that made you want to watch them dance! Good luck with the audition, DD always enjoyed it despite never being successful.

 

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There are several children in DDs JA class that don’t have full box splits. They do all have a lovely quality to the way they dance, and good (if not perfect) flexibility and turnout. The audition is a lovely experience in itself, and should be viewed as a special day out that may or may not lead to anything more. And any no should definitely be viewed as a ‘not yet’, as they encourage children to try again. A lot can change in a year with such young children. Good luck!

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22 hours ago, Selby1974 said:

My daughter will be auditioning this Friday. I can let you know after if you would like? My daughter can't do the box splits yet, so I hope not. I was told they do lots of different stretches and maybe froggies on their back? It is a minefield. Hopefully somebody who auditioned today in Newcastle might be able to give us some insight? 

What's a froggie?🙈 

Yes please that would be wonderful. I'm not going to stress her. But it would be interesting to know for myself x

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a froggie is lying on their back with their feet together and they have to try and lower their knees to the floor whilst keeping their back straight. I think. to be fair that could be completely wrong as i am clueless xx (as my daughter keeps telling me) :)

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Hi xx just finished the audition xx They did not have to do any splits, they did a straddle stretch etc also did the froggie on the back. 3 types of jump and barre work. They had them in lines of 4 behind each other. My daughter was in the front line, and it looked like they were arranged by height but can’t be sure. She thoroughly enjoyed it and is going to be gutted if she doesn’t get in. Going to be a long wait 😂😂 

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My DD auditioned today and came out with a big beaming smile - she particularly enjoyed pretending to be seaweed 😂! Interestingly she said near the start they took off their shoes and socks lined up in their 4 in front of the judges and stood in various positions - nothing complicated - first position, parallel, parallel facing the side etc. Holding each position for quite a while. I guess looking at feet /posture/body etc? 

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She was in Group 2 audition. In the third line of 4. I asked her if she thought it was in height order and she said she wasn’t sure as there were two little girls who were much shorter than her after her in the line. Who knows?! 

Edited by Darkbeans
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This was asked by someone back in the Autumn at the JA Insight Day and Sylvia Hubbard’s answer was that they don’t have a fixed number that they take in to the class and they don’t take a fixed number of yr4s/yr5s. They just take the ones that they really really like - so they could end up with a class of 10, 3 of which are yr4s and 7 are yr 5s or vice versa. 

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Of course if they definitely took in 7 year 3s last year, and the yr4/5 class has a max of 11/12ish(which it seems to have done in the past) , then they won’t take in much more than 5 yr3s and 4s into that class IN TOTAL. Essentially the odds are long 😫. Perhaps I should stop frying my brain about this now!!

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2 hours ago, Darkbeans said:

Of course if they definitely took in 7 year 3s last year, and the yr4/5 class has a max of 11/12ish(which it seems to have done in the past) , then they won’t take in much more than 5 yr3s and 4s into that class IN TOTAL. Essentially the odds are long 😫. Perhaps I should stop frying my brain about this now!!

The numbers are very difficult to work out and i got a similar answer when i asked how many places there are. They take who they want. There must be a maximum number depending on the size of the studio. 

I didn't realise at the start of this journey that it is not a whole new intake each year as some younger ones already have places for the following year making the chances of a place even smaller. 

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It's really best not to over think these things. It's easy to tie yourself up in knots trying to figure out what they are looking for, what the probability of a place is and how to interpret what happened at the audition. But the bottom line is that we don't know, probably never will do, and can't really influence any of it anyway! I think it's important for both children and parents to understand from the outset that there will be a LOT more "no" than "yes" letters - I think that overall about 1:10 are successful - as that does help put things into perspective, but beyond that I think it's best just to enjoy the audition as an experience in its own right and then forget about it until the results come. What will be will be. A "yes" is of course wonderful, but a "no" isn't necessarily bad - there will be many other opportunities for these little dancers I'm sure.

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8 hours ago, Selby1974 said:

Did they say how many places there are in the yeAr 4/5 class ?? As I know they took 7 year 3’s last year for the class but not sure how many they take every year ?? Any one know how it works ?? 

Hi, I was just wondering how you knew that 7 year 3's were taken last year? It seems like quite a high number of one age group when looking at the RBS annual reports the average amount of girls taken at Totnes is about 8 for both the year 4/5 and the year 6 class together.

Fingers crossed for your dancing daughter. Xx

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My friend has a daughter in the year 4/5 class and that is what she said. They took in 14 students the year before last according to the report 9 girls and 5 boys . Not sure how accurate the information is. 

Edited by Selby1974
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8 minutes ago, Selby1974 said:

My friend has a daughter in the year 4/5 class. 

Oh I see that makes sense. The RBS told me they take up to 16 per class but I don't think they ever have a class of 16!!

Edited by Dancer20
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My son is a Year 4 JA in London. He's in a 4/5 mixed class and there is 8 boys and 8 girls. There was 9 boys and 8 girls that started the year. I believe there are 4 year 4 boys and 4 year 4 girls. 

Hope that gives you an idea of one class intake from last year. 

But just enjoy the day and the class! Everyone is so friendly and caring. I kept trying to over think everything and nobody really knows what they look for. They take who they like and where they see potential for RBS training. Good Luck everyone. Xxx

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On 02/05/2018 at 08:42, JupiterSmith said:

My daughter is auditioning for the JA's this year. 

My sister previously auditioned and was asked to demonstrate her flexibility. Box splits etc. 

Has anyone else's child experienced the audition? I was just wondering what sort of things they will be asked to do. 

 

When my dd was a JA the dc who got into WL was definitely not the furthest down in splits. They are looking for many things in combination! 

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  • 3 weeks later...

Well my DD can only do side splits so I’m glad to hear there are a mix of those who can and can’t that get in. I have seen lots of photos on social media of DCs who are extremely flexible in all sorts of poses as they wait to go in for their audition (often one leg up in the air next to their heads!)

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  • 4 weeks later...

JupiterSmith, I’m so sorry your daughter got a no, I do think it’s better to view it as this wasn’t the right time for her yet, see if there are other associate classes etc that she may be interested in doing and then down the line decide if she wants to go for it again next year? Xx

Edited by Darkbeans
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43 minutes ago, Darkbeans said:

JupiterSmith, I’m so sorry your daughter got a no, I do think it’s better to view it as this wasn’t the right time for her yet, see if there are other associate classes etc that she may be interested in doing and then down the line decide if she wants to go for it again next year? Xx

They told us at the audition to put her forward for the Mids as applications open september. 

Oh I view it as it's a not now. Not a not ever. I just know how her mind will be thinking about every little thing she did xx

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I don’t think you can look for s reason.  So many children, so few spaces. My friends daughter got a yr4 place and she can’t do splits so it really is a combination of factors they are looking for x

Edited by Hazel
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This is how I think about it - 

 

When I was 16 I went for an interview for a Saturday job at the library. I REALLY wanted that job. I’d done 3 weeks work experience in the same library, so I knew the job, I was keen, I thought I had a really good chance against the other 16/17 year olds going for it. 

 

Later that day the lady phoned me, I hadn’t got it. They’d really liked me, but a lady in her 30s coming back in to work after having young children had applied. She had 10 years experience as a librarian. Of course I hadn’t got it. 

 

What I’m trying to say is it’s not necessarily anything that your daughter did wrong, it’s more what the other people did right. And none of us can control that, so all we can do is keep plugging away working hard at doing our thing and wait for the day that someone spots something special in us. Which will come, maybe not in the same field (I don’t work in a library now!) but it will come 😊. X

Edited by Darkbeans
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