Running Away to Join the Circus

A coworker mentioned this to me a while back and I thought it sounded really neat! There is a school over in St Paul that is for the Circus Arts Circus Jueventas.

We went ahead and enrolled Alanna in their toddler class and her first class was this past Saturday. There were 12 kids there and she was the youngest having just turned 3. She actually did really really well aside from the structure piece of the class. There were about 4 parents that needed to be near their children during the class and I was one of them, but I think in the next week or two, I'll be able to sit back and just let her do her thing without having to be right there.

They started off with some stretching and she had a little trouble understanding what they wanted her to do, but figured it out halfway through with some help. Then they started into this round robin type routine where they began the kids starting down a ramp with a somersault then moving on to standing in a hula hoop and throwing rings over a cone, then to a balance beam which was not the traditional beam, but more like two flexible pipes duct taped together, and finally to a little 'hill' (Alanna called it a rainbow) that they had to climb up on one side and slide down the other. Then they repeated that cycle several times and near the end doing backwards somersaults instead of frontwards. Alanna caught on to the rotation near the end, but I think it was hard for her to stay in tune with where she should be going next versus just wanting to play on whichever one struck her fancy. She practically raced across the balance beam.

Then they split the kids into three groups and started them at different stations. Alanna started on the trampoline. She was to jump in one spot, circle her arms back, then stop on command putting her hands palms forward in front of her, then arms up above her head before walking back. She did really well with the stopping and putting her arms up, but wanted to run in place jump rather than jumping with both of her feet together.

Then she got to move on to the handstand/balancing area. There were two wooden blocks for her to put one foot on each. Then they had her lift one leg at a time and balance. Then they flipped her upside down to do a handstand. She has fantastic balance and did great with it!

Lastly, they took turns on the globe. This is a huge ball that they stand on and balance. She did great with it and actually turned around once without losing her balance.

So now, we practice. We got a little mini jumper trampoline to work with her on and I brought my pilates mat upstairs so that she could somerault and we'd do stretches. I was really worried that she wouldn't like it, but as soon as we got home she wanted to practice, so we'll see how next class goes.