2 years on… Covid, from a Ballroom teacher’s perspective
This week we remembered the hundreds of thousands of people who sadly lost their lives to Covid-19. It probably bought back a lot of mixed emotions and memories of the day Boris made the announcement of the first UK lockdown – I can remember it vividly and I’m sure you can too.
Today’s blog won’t be one focussing on the sadness of the pandemic, nor the negativity, or what the lockdowns took from us, or the effects on individuals mental health or the devastating effect on businesses. Instead, I’m going to look at what we gained from a global pandemic and how it affected us positively, how its changed our own teaching, and why I think we are all better dancers because of it.
As one of the businesses arguably hardest hit by the pandemic – the nature of Ballroom dancing; close contact, indoors, and multiple people in an enclosed space at any one time – we were the first businesses to close in subsequent lockdowns and also the last to re-open. We also came to find that we wouldn’t qualify for any of the financial assistance (Thanks Rishi), so it gave a whole new meaning to “thinking on your feet”.
Back in March 2019, when the news reports were speculating about us following Italy’s lockdowns we headed to the Ballroom and spent two solid days filming everything we could possibly think of – routines, difficult figures, stretching, mobility exercises, basic ballroom fundamentals, the list went on. We were exhausted by the end of it, both mentally and physically but armed with hours and hours of content… now, what to do with it all?!
After the news of the lockdown, we launched our online paid Facebook group. On this group our members had unlimited access to us and all our Ballroom knowledge and years of experience and we encouraged our members to make the most of our free time.
We scheduled daily morning stretch sessions, which not only geared us all up for the day, but the consistency of these sessions soon started to see people (ourselves included) reaping the rewards with marked improvement in mobility, flexibility and co-ordination.
We had daily Zoom masterclasses where we worked on everything from foot action to sway to sports psychology and mindset. There were Q&A sessions and we also invited guests to speak about other areas in-directly relating to Ballroom dancing.
It was a huge learning curve for us. We had never had to teach in such a way – through a webcam, not able to have physical contact to demonstrate, help or feel, and with a completely different space - people’s living rooms!
I can say with confidence that the online group kept a lot of our students going through the first lockdown. It helped those that were alone to feel less isolated, it strengthened the bond and friendship between us and our students, and it certainly kept us going through what was a very difficult and dark time; all we have ever known is Ballroom dancing, so to have it taken away from us was a difficult lesson to learn.
In addition to the group we ran free weekly Saturday stretch classes on Facebook Live which connected us to even more students, and our Tuesday classes were replaced by Zoom and made for a great source of entertainment, whether that was tea towels as capes for Paso Doble, students turning up in fancy dress, hilarious Zoom backgrounds, or my then-puppy Didge getting a little too friendly with me whilst I demonstrated a Rumba move!! The camaraderie and sense of community was something really quite special.
As the lockdown started to ease we were still left in the dark being unable to return to The Piccadilly. At this time outside exercise was allowed, so with the help of our students (special thanks to Martin, Stephen, David, and Jackie), we built The Mini-dilly! We grabbed our tools and made a sprung dance floor complete with roof in my front garden.
Although we were still unable to touch or dance with people due to social distancing rules, it allowed people to continue dancing and we found yet more ways of teaching without touch (cue Andrey’s long broom handle…)
Reflecting on the last two years and the devastation that Covid and lockdowns have caused would be somewhat easy. There is no denying that it is probably one of the hardest situations humanity has had to face in our lifetime. But seeing the good in a very dismal situation is not always so easy.
Not only have we seen vast improvements in our students due to having to dance solo, and being forced to work on basic fundamental actions so key to Ballroom dancing. It also gave them time and space to re-evaluate their own dancing and perhaps think about it in a different way to before – it certainly changed how we think and teach now!
But one of the biggest take aways would be the renewed sense of community and friendship that we gained during that time. And this has only become stronger now we are back to “normality” and we can be all the more grateful for lessons, classes and social dances having experienced life without them. Our dancing holiday at North Cadbury Court was testament to this.
Thank you for your support then, and thank you for your continued support now as we return to our new normality with a slightly different perspective and an even greater love and appreciation for Ballroom dancing and all the good it brings.