Tonight I got to give a 20 min private lesson to a six year old girl who had never before skated at all. At first, she declined, saying she didn't want to fall. Then, after watching the classes for a few minutes, she decided to try. This child was amazing. We did knee bending, falling ang getting up off ice first. On ice, I had her put one hand on the boards while I showed her the little marching steps. At first, she was taking huge, high steps forward, but she was able to listen, understand, and do each correction I asked for. Within ten minutes, she was doing fine and heading off the boards on her own. If I told her to bend her knees, she did it right away. If I reminded her to put her hands on her table, they were corrected immediately. She hardly looked down at all. Part way through the lesson, she asked what the knee bending was for, and understood the explanation! She then observed that bending her knees caused the skates to move over the ice. She has natural turnout, so she was actually beginning swizzles on her own. I wasn't so impressed with her skating as I was with her intelligence and maturity. She ended the lesson loving to skate and practiced the rest of the session. By the end, she was skating across the rink on her own and grinning all the way. What a pleasure
12-10-2002, 08:37 PM
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