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In Grandma’s Attic is a ballet-oriented, fantasy-dance program for Ages 2 – 12 offered and created by Deborah Bailay, formerly of Washington School of the Ballet. It is designed to nurture a dance student from their early years of Pre-Ballet training (3 levels) through their first and second years of Beginning levels of ballet. Therefore students follow an entire curriculum. Alongside the training aspects, the program also gives students the look and feel of ballet as a performance art for the stage with the use of costumes, headpieces, props, scenery, fairytales or classical ballet stories. By fostering the creative process and self-expression, students develop in a wholesome, natural progression. After the faculty present an engaging synopsis of the story in the grand tradition of ballet storytelling, the students dress-up and pretend to be characters in the stories. Storydancing, creative movement, improvisation and acting skills are strongly developed within the context of make-believe fun. The program is also designed to prepare ongoing students for placement in an Intermediate level ballet class at a ballet school. At this juncture they leave fantasy storydancing behind to spend their time solely on technical training. Because they have spent a large portion of their formative dance years nurturing their imaginations and love of stories, they will carry these deeply stored movement experiences with them into their dancing futures! |