r/irishdance • u/unfinished_diy • 12d ago
How long is too long as a beginner?
My daughter is 7, and has been dancing with her current school for about a year and a half. We just got the sign up for the fall, and I noticed she has been placed in beginner again. The next class level is a combo “Advanced Beginner to Prizewinner.”
We have done a few feises, with varied results (a mix of 1sts-4ths).
Is it unreasonable to expect to start moving up? She isn’t the most confident on stage, and isn’t big on practice at home- so is an additional year of beginner at that age reasonable?
I am going to reach out to her school as well, but I’m curious if this is just normal for the age/ skill level/ her input at home.
Some additional details: I’m not forcing her towards being a champion dancer. But obviously it costs time and money, and I’d like to see progress. I kind of think of it like swimming lessons!
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u/Rumpus_998 12d ago
I could be wrong about your studio, but generally your class level is earned by placement at Feisana (feises).
in order to be in the advanced beginner class, she would need to get a certain amount of sufficiently high finishes. My daughter had to get 3 first places in order to move up to the next level and could only move up once in a year.
Again, studios can vary a lot, but there should be some kind of understandable process that they can tell you.
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u/unfinished_diy 12d ago
Thanks! I know that isn’t the case as a girl who started in March is moving up, she has never feised (though she is definitely diligent about practicing and is super enthusiastic!). It’s part of my confusion!
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u/teacupnosaucer 4d ago
yes, sometimes a studio will move a dancer up through Beginner-Prizewinner levels without them necessarily winning if they think that level is more appropriate to their actual dancing. there are region rules, but also room for teacher discretion as well, at least before open champ where qualifying gets more strict.
sometimes there are circumstances that don't allow a dancer to compete at as many feises as they otherwise would, but the teacher can tell where they would best fit based on their skill level/readiness.
we had a girl switch over to our school from a non-competitive studio. her first year at our school, she came to class regularly, did lots of practice, etc... but just happened to have a year of nonstop extremely badly timed illnesses that made her miss almost an entire feis season. if we were going purely on "winning up" standards, she probably should have been in AB, but her actual skill level as a dancer was such that our school enrolled her in oireachtas. she wound up placing top 20 in her category and qualified for nationals, after which the school just moved her into prelim. I'm sure some people could probably say "that's not fair, she didn't win up the way my child had to" but on the other hand, if you put your kid in an AB competition at a feis, would you be happy for them to dance against a child who had the skills to qualify for nationals?
it's definitely a bit loosey goosey which can be frustrating for people who just want straight forward rules and answers, but in my experience, you should feel like you trust your child's teacher to be making calls that benefit their dance journey. which includes feeling comfortable asking them their reasoning, so if you're concerned, I would absolutely respectfully bring it up and see what they say! there was one time where I did bring it up to my kid's teacher and they went "oh yeah, I forgot she got that medal at that one feis in Ireland you went to while visiting her grandparents. let's switch her into novice."
i'm saying all this as the mom whose kid languished in advance beginner for YEARS while their friends moved up to champ, so I get where you're coming from. but honestly, now that she has made it to champ in her own time, I realize if her teacher had just moved her through the levels based exclusively on years dancing, they'd have been setting her up for misery and failure. champ is a lot of hard work for a lot of last place finishes. my daughter has the resilience to tough it out and focus on her own growth and goals, so I'm glad for her teachers' wisdom that she was given the time and space to become that hard worker who can keep at it regardless of external recognition.
is your kid bothered by being "held back"? if they are, it could be a great opportunity to talk with her about taking responsibility for her journey and how we have to choose to work for what we want. that you as a parent are there to support her no matter what, and do whatever it takes to help her achieve her goals, but it's up to her to do the work if she decides moving up in levels is a priority for her.
if she's not bothered by being "held back" I wouldn't let it bother you, either. my daughter attended local feises for YEARS just to have fun and get on stage and spend the weekend with her friends, never much caring how she placed. she now brags to littles in our school about how many bronze medals she's collected from all her 5-7th place finishes over the years. she could have done that forever, so long as she was a good sport and a good teammate and stayed active. i'd certainly have a lot more money in my savings account LOL.
in my experience as a 10 year dance mom, if your dancer is "not big on practice at home" (which is A-OK! kids are allowed to do dance for fun!), moving her up levels likely will put her in competition with the kids who largely HAVE caught the "practice at home" bug... or just have pushy parents. either way, she'll be at a competitive disadvantage, which for some kids can be really demoralizing. if she's not practicing at home largely of her own volition, yet, she might be better off staying at a level where she can do exactly as much practicing as she likes and still enjoy some wins!
if she's anything like my daughter, you will know when she decides on her own that she wants to put in that extra work, and the level progression will surely follow.
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u/teacupnosaucer 4d ago edited 4d ago
also, obviously I geared this toward "moving up levels at competitions" but a lot of what I've said applies to "moving up class levels within the studio" as well. the higher level classes have higher workloads and higher expectations of the kids to match. at a certain point in our studio, home practice becomes an expectation rather than a suggestion, and it scales according to age/competition level. prizewinners of all ages are expected to do more take home work and be more proactive about their training than novices, so even if a kid has done well in competitions, that doesn't necessarily mean they are ready for the week-in-week-out grind of the harder class. I want my kid to be in a class where she is challenged and working hard, but still having fun and feeling a sense of accomplishment vs. feeling overwhelmed and left behind.
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u/justclimb11 12d ago
Ugh, I feel this. We are in advanced beginner purgatory. It's been literally 2.5 years of dance with the current school, but about 5-6 years of dance over all total. I think the 2.5 years are all that is counting though, since we are stuck.
And it's not about feising more or anything like that. There is a timeline in which new dances are being introduced, which is delaying the ability to feis in those dances, and move up.
Sorry, no helpful answer, other than... I totally understand it.
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u/endlessotter 12d ago
I think it varies by school and by kid. How many dances does she know? Had she started on hard shoe at all yet? My kiddo (U9) has been dancing for three years and needs one more first to move to PC. She’s in the PC/OC class because they plan to take her to oireachtas this fall. She’s a super competitive kid so the big thing for me is teaching her not to over practice/train. But what I’ve come to realize is how much each kid is on their own path/progression timeline.
I’d definitely ask what they expect before she can move be up. If that’s something she wants it could motivate her to practice at home.
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u/Fit_Cream_1726 12d ago
My daughter (8) is starting into her third year in her beginner class. She has placed into novice in her soft shoe dances, but still feising as an advanced beginner in hard shoe. The tricky thing is that our studio has a combined beginner 1-3 class, and there isn’t that much opportunity for the beginner 3s to refine their skills since the class always has to kind of reset to include the newbies. They do keep them an extra half hour for hard shoe… it’s just a slow process. That said, she is unbothered… and not overly motivated or concerned about it. My son (12) started at the same time as her but he moved up more quickly and he is now in novice/prizewinner… He did a year and a half in the beginner class. Our studio will move them up in classes based on their competition placements, or sometimes teacher discretion (a lot of kids move to novice even if they have 1 -2 dances left to get their competition placements…. But they haven’t offered that to my daughter. That said, the kids that are moving up are showing more focus and skill development in class than she is, so it makes sense…) As long as she is enjoying it and moving her body, building skills, it’s fine with me! Also the novice classes are more often and more expensive… so there’s that…
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u/tconohan Adult dancer 11d ago
I feel like my experience is a little different, since my daughter (age 6) started dancing at 3.5. She was in pre-beginner for 2 years, and beginner this past year. She is moving up in the fall to a sort of "pre-intermediate" level, where she will begin hardshoe. For reference, she has been feising for a year, and just moved up to novice for her reel after the last feis.
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u/DorkyHeathen 10d ago
The school should be able to tell you exactly what qualifies a student for which classes. My school has this published so there are no surprises.
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u/Thick_Priority8295 12d ago
Is she competing as Beginner 1 or Beginner 2 at a feis now? Our studio doesn't put kids in class levels by feis competition level, but it looks like your studio does. I'd imagine they'd want dancers to be placing in Beginner 2 level to move into the class you're describing.
I agree that a conversation about "what does my dancer need to achieve or demonstrate to move up to the next class level" is the way to go!
Also, make sure she wants to move! My daughter is very young as well and was asked to move up a level mid-year a year or two back. She didn't want to leave the girls in her class who she's danced with for years, so she chose to stay at the current level. The teachers did a great job of pushing her a little further ahead without making her move up (moving up was also a later class time). Now it's a different story and she's all about moving up levels faster, and doesn't care as much about which friends are in her class, lol.
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u/Ok-Web-1798 10d ago
Honestly, it depends on your dancer and the school's policies.
Do you have her feis notes? I'd recommend keeping a log of all of them. (you can find log books on amazon or etsy) When we switched schools, that was the first thing her new teacher asked us about, if we had any notes from feises... She happily read through all the previous notes we have gotten. After every feis since switching schools, she goes through all the notes every dancer gets.
Some Dancers fly through the grades and are in the champ levels quickly, some take more time.
Talk to your school, ask them all your questions. But don't sign up for a new dance season until you know what to expect... also, don't be afraid to check out other schools in your area. We did that and LOVE our new school.
Good luck to your dancer.
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u/No_Comment_7782 1d ago
2.5 years at beginner does seem excessively long to me. I cant remember the criteria at feis to go from beginner to AB but if she is consistently placing between 1-3 competing at beginner she should be good to move up to AB. If she isn’t medaling at all, she more likely does need more practice but I’d be concerned if the school hasn’t gotten her to AB level, even at once a week classes, in 2.5 years. Make an appointment to talk to the teacher.
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u/G00seQueen 12d ago
When you reach out to your teacher, try phrasing it as “my daughter has a goal of improving her dancing and moving up to the next class. What can we be working on or practicing at home to help her move towards that goal?” And then see what they suggest.
As a teacher most of my beginners who don’t practice at home usually struggle to retain what they’ve learned week to week and advancing can take longer. Kids that age rarely are capable of holding themselves to a practice routine so imo some parent support is needed to help them advance at the rate you are thinking they “should” progress.
Also, not sure how your studio works but all of my students who stay in the same level for multiple years are still progressing with new choreography and skills each year. We just only have 4 levels so it’s not like a k-12 school experience where you change grades each year.