Ugh, how do we fit all this in? You have so much vocabulary you want to cover, so many exercises to include at the barre, artistic elements to explore, concepts from the last class that need to be revisited . . . . How on earth do you fit everything in and teach a great ballet class?
First things first: do you have a master plan for your year? Whether that's a curriculum or a set of goals you've made, you need a master plan. Having a top priority (in the Geeky Ballerina curriculum we call them key principles) gives you the clarity you need.
Next, it's time to apply a principle called selective abandonment. Take a step back, a deep breath, and admit that fitting everything into a 60--75-minute class isn't going to happen. Especially if you want to use some of that time to explain concepts, answer questions, or repeat exercises. So look at your lesson plan and decide, in advance, what you will leave out today.
Selective abandonment is intentional. If your key principle is stability you won't leave out adagio very often. You'll probably alternate between barre and center adagio, but adagio specifically supports your key principle. If one of your new vocabulary steps is assemblé, you'll want to include that in every lesson for a while. But you could wait a couple of weeks between exercises that focus on chassé because it isn't on the top of your list. It's not that you're never going to have your students chassé again, you're just selectively choosing what to add (and what to subtract) from your classes.
As long as you are keeping track between classes of what has been left out and making sure that the less-repeated steps are still getting included fairly regularly, your classes are going to do just fine. In fact, you'll probably find that the kids progress faster (because they can focus on the same concept for a greater proportion of class time) and have more fun (because you don't feel stressed or rushed).
If you don't have a master plan, I can help you with that.
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