Weekday
The weekly feature page of the University Daily Kansan April 13. 1979
Becky Johnson, of the Lawrence School of Ballet, teaches preparatory ballet twice a week to children between the ages of 4 and 6. The class works on basic movement and several ballet steps
During the hour, the arabesques wobbled, the plies went against the beat and the gazes shifted out the window instead of on the teacher, but the dancers were still . . .
Budding Ballerinas
Stephanie Crupper is the youngest ballet student in Johnson's class. The energetic ballet dancer has an interest in music.
Many spend more time sticing their tongues out at the wall mirror and making faces at each other across the dusty dance floor than concentrating on each pointed toe and poised
But nearly all the members of Becky Johnson's beginning ballet classes at the Lawrence School of Ballet, 2001, W. Eighth St., have spent in tights and dance slippers could be fun.
"I like it," said 8-year-old Kimberly Harvey
"it's fun."
"I like it," 11 and 11-year-old Alisha Washburn. "I do it because I want to dance disco舞."
"It's OK, but I get bored," said one tiny dancer, who scurried off to return her teacher's bed.
Whatever their reason, Johnson works with them all, three times a week, sustaining sticky
fingers, forgotten dance slippers, fallen hair clips and a thousand questions, to teach two classes of preparatory ballet students and one class of beginners.
"Becky, how come your shoes don't have a how?" asked one budding ballerina.
"Will you show me where the bathroom is?" asked another.
"Becky, my hair is in my eyes," said another little dancer. "Do you have a rubber band to fix
And another said, "I'm too squinched. Will you make me 'move'?"
Despite the time she spends meeting their demands, Johnson, who lives in Baldwin, said that "it's hard to believe" that.
"I enjoy working with children," she said.
"It is a different kind of challenge than teaching
One girl in black beards burst into tears and asked Johnson to escort her from the room.
"Just a time or two more and we'll be finished," she said to comfort the squirring
"Quit making faces in the mirror, girls," she said later.
With the twenty-six 5- and 6-year-olds in her preparatory classes, she works on basic movement and a few ballet moves, all in quick succession to hold their short attention spans.
"Keep your hands to yourself, Susie. "Johnson warned when she returned to the floor
In the 13-member beginning class, made up of 6- to 11-year-olds, the session started with warm-up stretches, progressed through basic exercises and then moved on to danced with an attempt to learn a new folk dance.
"Becky, Becky," the first time I ever leaped, "exclaimed one young balerina after a horrible fall on the horse's arms flapping in a horse gallop, got carried away and looked as if they were dashing to frost."
During the hour, the arabes abrashed wobbled, the plies went against the beat and the gazes shifted out the window instead of focusing on the teacher, but the energy never stoned.
The mothers, who were asked to wait out of view of the young ones, offered different
reasons for bringing their daughters to ballet school.
"They're not very serious about it," said the mother of 6-year-old Rebecca and 7-year-old Jennifer Nelson. "I think they'd rather sit at them, but it's good for them. It's good for their bodies."
Randa Zakaryk, 8. asked to start ballet and
enjoys it, her mother said.
"She wanted to join and she dances all the time around the house," she said.
"We were watching television one night and he saw 'The Turning Point' and thought it was really beautiful," Foster said. "He asked if he could enter it."
But Bucky Cox, Lawrence's celebrated 16-year marathon runner, is showing that you don't have to be a girl to be interested in dance. Cox is enrolled in the Monday afternoon preparatory classes at his own request. Ray Foster, his trainer, said.
Foster said Bucky loved his class and often demonstrated the steps he had learned for his mother, Joni Maxwell, and Foster. Foster said Bucky never had thought of dance as being just for girls until a friend at school razzed him about it.
"This kid he plays with at school really gave him a hard time when Bucky told him he was in ballet," Foster said. "I reminded him that in the Turning Point' all the men spoke with foreign accent and that in this country you're not going to dance ballet. Bucky thought it was hilarious."
Johnson said that whether the young dancers were male or female, her soars were the same.
"You try to teach body armor, if nothing else," she said, as the toy dancers trailed off to
"The main objective is not only to introduce them to the dance but to build an enjoyment and appreciation of it at a time. I mean if they want to go on," then they probably won't want to go on."
Story by Rhonda Holman
Photos by Trish Lewis
Julia Hiert and Monique Mitchell mix some serious ballet with a little fun before class begins