Lessons: how often? and what do you do between lessons?

K

KevinL

New Member
Related to the topic of what you consider a "lesson", how often do you have lessons? Once a week? Once a day? Never?

Assuming that you do attend lessons of some sort, what do you do between lessons to keep up your skills? Social dance? Practice with a partner? Nothing?

Just curious what you do to keep up with what you learn in lessons.

Kevin
 
When I first started, three to four times a week. Now I do once per week, and try to work on technique in between. Social dancing isn't really practice for me--it's for fun (although you can learn a lot by working on a couple of technical things while you social dance).

I've been completely unable to find a partner to practice with outside of lessons--the people I've worked with seem to have no staying interest; now granted, they're mostly actresses, and maybe that's the problem....
 
Lessons, as a beginner I was taking beginner groups through the local university twice a week for the first month, then it escalated. Through the roof. Okay, I got hooked big time.
All group lessons within and without the uni - 12 hours max (usually around 10 hours)
Social practice 5 hours.

Good quality group lessons will help enormously and cut down on costs. Someplaces focus on privates and the groups are for feelgood, not much on how to dance. Great for some so I'm not knocking it. Deends on why you want to dance.

After a year or so I started taking a private a week (1hr) with whatever partner I ended up with that week. Not a good idea, you really need a regular partner to optimise, either the instructor themselves or an amateur.

Once I hit this country I started more privates up to three a week. I do know some people who are taking up to 15 a week (cost for them is around $100CAN per hour, they have a really good salesman as their instructor, top flight instruction in Toronto costs around $60-$70CAN per hour/55min).

Nowadays I am between main jobs so I am teaching dance, dancehosting and temping and tutoring and labouring and doing anything I can to earn a living. So I am now learning mainly from video and using my brain a great deal (why does that work, how can I get that to work etc.). I still socially dance around 12 hours a week on top of the rest of it all.
It's good for the sole and the soul (body and spirit).

D-spot.
Rule of thumb 1 hour private to 4 hours practice to get the greatest bang for your buck IF it is dancing you are wanting.
 
D-spot said:
Once I hit this country I started more privates up to three a week. I do know some people who are taking up to 15 a week (cost for them is around $100CAN per hour, they have a really good salesman as their instructor, top flight instruction in Toronto costs around $60-$70CAN per hour/55min).
Click to expand...

15 private lessons a week? Wow. That's more than two hours every day!

First, I can't believe that anyone can afford to do that. Second, how do they get the time to process what they cover in the private lessons?

Wow.

Kevin
 
My dance schedule per week

Monday nights 2 hours "beginner" lessons (not that I need them, but I help out)

Tuesday nights up to 3 hours in "beginning" swing/salsa (technique, learning lindy this semester)

Thursday nights 2 hours in intermediate ballroom

Socially, I guess I dance up to 6 hours each weekend usually. Sometimes, it's crazy enough that I'll do 10 hours on some weekends.

Then...

Private lessons every two weeks on Sundays for 2 hours.

Practice with partner (in light of this competition this weekend), up to two hours Tuesday nights (when I'm not taking the lindy class, or she's not taking the WCS class, or I'm helping out the class).

I will practice solo whenever I can, either Monday nights during the beginner ballroom lesson or Tuesday nights waiting for my partner to show up.

Of course, the summer is coming, and the club I advise on Wednesday nights doesn't meet. So then I may hook onto the schedule another 2 hours of lessons in something. Maybe I may wind up with another dance partner for my club stuff... in which we may have another set of privates to deal with. Oiy.
 
etchuck, you said
"Private lessons every two weeks on Sundays for 2 hours. "

A while ago i was considering this. I mean taking a 1 or 2 hour lesson, every 2nd week. I am curious to know why you decided to do it. I was considering it because it gives me more time to practice the lesson material in between private lessons.
 
In my case, the teachers for the private lessons come once a month (do not live in the area), but are staggered out every two weeks. That spacing does make things easy for me though, especially considering I take so many lessons, it's easy to confuse things. Also, I tend to want my weekends flexible, so I cannot really commit every Sunday night to it. Heck, sometimes I cannot make the privates due to other events I have to attend.

P.S. Yeah... triple-digits in posting! :)
 
I do one lesson of Ceroc and one lesson of Latin and Ballroom a week. Then I just go to as many places to dance in the weekend as I can! :)

(Practice? What's that? I just dance!!!)
 
I do three one-hour lessons per week - one each of Latin, Ballroom and New Vogue. I have a regular Sunday afternoon practice session with my partner and some friends from the studio for a couple of hours - we usually focus on Ballroom which seems to be the more common interest.

We go out for social dancing whenever we can - usually to the local RSA club, which has live bands every Friday and Saturday night. You can mostly only do jives/rock n rolls, rhythm foxtrots and chachas to that though. My dance teacher also organises a monthly "social" which is 3 or four hours on a Sunday evening - it's better than going out publicly as we have regular recorded music from all dance styles so there's more variety. Plus, usually people at the social are dancers, as opposed to the regulars at the RSA who are people who like to dance but have no floor ettiquette! They're hard to negotiate around but it's good practice.

Looking at the replies already posted, there seems to be a wide variety of different amounts of lesson/practice time - interesting! I'm about to do my first competition so I guess I'll be putting in a bit more "serious" practice - but dancing is so much fun that it never seems like hard work anyway!
 
My lesson schedule at the moment is this (lessons are around 45 minutes each):

Monday - 1 private lesson and 1 showcase lesson
Wednesday - 1 Intermediate Bronze ballroom and latin group
Thursday - 1 Intermediate Bronze south american group
Friday - Social party (roughly works out to be time of 2 lessons)
Saturday - 2 showcase lessons

In between lessons? Well after working full time and other necessary life stuff, not a great deal of time for actual practice, but I'll generally manage to slip in some sort of practice on a daily basis. Whether it be balance for waltz, forward poise, cha cha action, whatever.
 
Typically I take 2 to 3 group lessons per week. My privates are taken as needed, some with an instructor only, others with a partner preparing for competition, and practice with partner once per week when preparing for competition. In between, I practice trying to improve technique learned in the lessons, and I tend to dance socially 3 to 4 times per month.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Dance Ads

Advertise on Dance Forums Reach dancers, teachers, studios, event organizers, and dance-friendly brands. View ad options
Back
Top