ADVANCED CLASSES
Ages 14-17
Call today to set up a trial class for evaluation.
Dancers with 5 or more years of graduated training should be placed in classes based on Teacher recommendation and Director Approval. All dancers Level 3+ are required to take Ballet.
These classes will have the option to compete if chosen by the GCAPA Crew. Participation is optional.
GCAPA, prefers not to seek out dancers from other studios, therefore we do not actively promote our upper level classes. We seek to promote our students from within. We believe that it is important for a dancer to stay with his/her studio as long as possible to gain the most benefit from the instruction. If you are a local dancer looking to relocate to GCAPA, please first consider staying in your home studio and explaining the reasons you might be looking elsewhere for instruction to your current Studio Owner. If you cannot find a resolution and would like to consult about your options here, please email Wendi@gcapa.net for more information. Please do not enroll yourself in any classes that require placement unless you have been placed specifically. Please call with any additional questions. SEE BOTTOM OF PAGE FOR A LEVEL CHART
TRANSPARENCY IS KEY TO A GREAT RELATIONSHIP. THIS HANDBOOK INCLUDES ALL THE INFORMATION YOU NEED TO MAKE AN INFORMED DECISION ABOUT YOUR CHILD'S DANCE EDUCATION.
Contact Studio for placement 704-896-3033, info@gcapa.net
dance team opportunities for ADVANCED level dancers.
The choreography for the dance numbers is amazing! Super fun to watch at recital for the whole family
I am a dancer at GCAPA and have been for 10+ years. I absolutely love it! The teachers truly want what’s best for their students and treat everyone like family. GCAPA gives skills to use inside and outside of dance. I have learned so much from dance skills to becoming a better person, this was all because of GCAPA! Miss Wendi has made a incredible business and environment for everyone. It is my happy place and I could not ask for better teachers or peers!
What makes an Advanced Dancer?
It’s easy to assume that a dancer in high school with 10+ years of training is equivalent to an advanced dancer, but that’s not always the case. It’s more dependent on what ingredients are included in the Lake Norman Dance Studio training that determines advanced placement. You can bake cookies for 10 years, but feeding them to only your dog without someone showing you how to make them tastier, you’re not likely to make it to the Culinary Institute of America.
Mindset
An advanced dancer has a self-competitive mindset. He or she is not concerned with what others are doing, how they’re doing it, or who they’re doing it with…unless it will somehow make them better. The mind of a champion comes from a dancer who seeks innovation and challenge. Perhaps it’s not about frosting the cookie, but injecting the frosting into the center of the cookie and then shielding it from visibility to create a delightful surprise. An advanced Lake Norman Dance Studio dancer lives for the next difficult step, the next new turn, and the next impossible turn sequence. To be an advanced dancer, one must have the mindset of a champion. This comes from years of confidence building throughout the course of proper training.
Skillset
At GCAPA, we operate on a 10 Level scale. Advanced Lake Norman Dance Studio placement begins at Level 7, with 10 being the final tier before high school graduation. Within those levels, students who have acquired particular skills to graduate to each level, may continue on toward the L10 goal. Dancers who don’t meet the requirements to graduate to the next level spend additional time in their current level until the requirement has been met. Merit is the only true form of progression that is honest and fair to both the dancer and his or her peers. A dancer who can handle the emotional disappointment of not moving up with his or her peers has the character that it takes to become a champion.
Starting “late”
It is possible to start late and become an advanced dancer before high school graduation. Many notorious dancers have done so. Many principal male dancers do not begin dance training until high school or college and go on to have long, lucrative careers in Lake Norman Dance Studio companies all over the world.
Many sports, gymnastics for one, have a standard policy of starting before age 5 or before puberty to guarantee success or advanced placement and often will not give a student the chance to even consider advanced placement in their future after a certain age because it is too difficult to progress. Dee Gordon and Lorenzo Cain did not start playing baseball until high school and they are both now MLB players. Darrell Green(a Pro Football Hall of Famer), Carson Wentz (Eagles All-Pro Quarterback), Marcus Mariota (No. 2 Overall Draft Pick in 2015) all began playing Football their senior year in high school. As for famous dancers, Wildebeest began training at 15, Ayodele Casele (world famous tap dancer) began at age 19 to meet a movement requirement for her acting major! Brandon Leffler of Ballet Austing, “Gossip Girl” and “30 Rock” began dancing at 16! “Late” starts are not impossible boulders in life. As long as you continue to forge forward in your Lake Norman Dance Studio training, anything is possible!
At GCAPA, we offer BEGINNER classes from walking age to 14 because for some, the urge to begin dance lessons comes later in childhood. See the chart below for the approximate GCAPA progression.
1Age of entry 2Merit based placement for dancers seeking to move beyond recreational status.
| Starting at Age 3-6 | Starting at Age 7-10 | Starting at Age 11-14 | |||
| Age 3 | Sparkle Babies | ||||
| Age 4 | Sparkle Tots | ||||
| Age 5-6 | Sparkle Kids | ||||
| Age 6 | Sparkle Stars | ||||
| Age 7 | Level 1A | Age 7-10 | Level 1B | ||
| Age 8 | Level 2A | Age 8-10 | Level 2A/2B | ||
| Age 9 | Level 3A | Age 9-11 | Level 3B | ||
| Age 10 | Level 4 | Age 10-12 | Level 4 | ||
| Age 11 | Level 5 | Age 11-13 | Level 5 | Age 11-14 | Level 1C |
| Age 12 | Level 6 | Age 12-13 | Level 6 | Age 12-13 | Level 1C |
| Age 13 | Level 7 | Age 13-14 | Level 7 | Age 13-14 | Merit based |
| Age 14 | Level 8 | Age 14-15 | Level 8 | Age 14-15 | Merit based |
| Age 15 | Level 9 | Age 15-16 | Level 9 | Age 16 | Merit based |
| Age 16 | Level 10 | Age 16-17 | Level 10 | Age 17 | Merit based |
Tips for the dancer who yearns to be “advanced”
Always listen to your teachers. Always apply their corrections, even if you disagree. The teacher is not wasting her breath to show you she knows more than you. And if you don’t apply her corrections, she will eventually stop giving them to you which is a sure sign that she is no longer interested in you because you don’t trust her expertise. Treat all critiques as compliments because a teacher willing to emotionally invest in your progress enough to tell you how to get better is a teacher who believes that you can! Kudos to you!
Always listen to critiques given to others. If you are standing in line to go across the floor, stand in the back of the line so that you can hear all of the corrections given before you. It’s like having all the answers to the test out loud before you have to take it! Also listen to the praise and learn from it.
Be willing to dance next to anyone! As long as you are learning something, it doesn’t matter who is in the room with you. There is a popular adage about dancers by Dick Crum:
Beginner Dancer: Knows nothing
Intermediate Dancer: Knows everything. Too good to dance with beginners.
Hot Shot Dancer: Too good to dance with anyone.
Advanced Dancer: Dances everything, especially with beginners.
As dancers, we yearn for the class with our peers where everyone is the same level, same ability, same age, same amount of passion. But that is never the case. You can seek it out all your life but it will never happen. Every single class is full of different personalities, different measures of competitive nature, different attitudes, and different ages. The Lake Norman Dance Studio Advanced dancer is the one who finds lessons in everything and applies them. The Advanced dancer’s only goal is self-improvement.