Welcome!
So glad you’ve connected with The Ballet Source! I’m Kim, and I am so pleased to be sharing this incredible curriculum resource with you, fellow ballet teacher, studio owner or student teacher.
My story is simple, I started teaching in 2008 with little to no teaching resources. I had grown up dancing in an incredible ballet program at DaySpring School of the Arts in St. Louis, MO. My ballet teacher, Robyn Hartley, inspired all of her students to press forward in their paths, and I knew mine would be teaching, but I really had nowhere to start. I felt pretty silly going into a dance class without any proper planning, so I went online to seek resources.
What I discovered shocked me. There were little to no real legitimate ballet teaching resources available for download online. I couldn’t find much of anything outside of a few classroom handouts and some online dictionary sites. I was not opposed to paying for what I needed, but there was not much out there for free or for purchase.
Later, after some travel abroad teaching in Spain, I went back to DaySpring School of the Arts, this time as a ballet teacher for 5 to 7 year olds. It was there that I was exposed, for the first time, to Ruth Brinkerhoff‘s Ballet Arts for Young Children curriculum series. I began using it in my class and was blown away with its easy-to-follow, age-appropriate structure that allowed me, a young relatively inexperienced ballet teacher, to walk into class with a full understanding of what I was teaching, but more importantly, why I would be teaching it.
It is my hope that they help you in the way they’ve helped me. Too many schools operate without a set curriculum for their youngest dancers, but perhaps the Ballet Arts for Young Children series can be how us teachers, in our digital age, inspire the future’s best ballet dancers.
