Dance - There's no I in TEAM

Teamwork at school picked up last year and, now in 6th grade, is almost a constant.  There have been so many team projects this year, and your grade is dependent on how the team performs in addition to your individual participation.  I sort of have mixed feelings on this as the kids are not allowed to pick teammates.  I've asked the girls if anyone has complained to the teacher about being placed in a team with specific team members and they tell me their teachers have said that when you're an adult, you won't be able to pick your co-workers and you'll have to learn to adjust and work with people you don't want to.  While this is true, I've told the girls that hopefully your employer won't hire and/or keep slackers.  I know from experience that slackers in the workplace do exist and sometimes it takes awhile, but they usually don't last for long.

At work, whenever I sent out an email to my team with an action plan during crunch time, I would always include the statement Remember, there's no I in TEAM.  So while the girls have been learning a great deal about teamwork at school, they're also growing as team members in their dance company.  The girls participated in their first competition of the season last weekend.  Our studio currently has three competition dance teams and all three are in a large group dance with a candy theme this year.  Then the girls' dance team has their own dance, which has a winter theme.  For this specific competition, the girls' dance team only competed in the large group dance.  The studio decided to not have them do their winter dance this time around.  Believe me, my kids would love to be in as many dances as possible but our studio is smaller and competition dances are limited.

Before I get into the details of the competition, I have to talk about what the girls and some of their teammates witnessed in the dressing room.  Another dance team was working on their choreography but they were openly arguing with one another.  You're going too fast.  No, you're going too slow.  It's supposed to be this way, not the way you're doing it.  Watching this disagreement reiterated what the girls have been taught:  1.  Don't argue with your teammates, especially in front of others.  2.  Come prepared.  3.  Act professional.

A team needs a strong leader.  For a dance team, that leader is going to be their teacher.  The girls are really lucky to have an awesome teacher.  I like how she focuses on teamwork and professionalism, in addition to dance technique.  This isn't just about learning a dance for a competition.  There's a lot behind it.

I'm bummed I don't have any high quality professional photos to share with you.  Most of these competitions have a strict no photo/no video policy (because they want you to purchase these from them, of course) and threaten to take points away if someone is caught with a camera.  Because I'm moving around a lot, taking care of the girls' hair and make-up, I didn't even bother to bring my camera to the competition.  It takes a lot to babysit it when I'm running around.

                                             (What would we do without our phones) 

Because of the no camera policy, I had originally planned to do a mini photo shoot before we left the house.  Then we found out we needed to be at the competition at 9 in the morning with hair and make-up, costumes on, ready to go.  I should know by now to multiply by three however long I think it's going to take me to finish hair and make-up.  We left the house on time and arrived in the dressing room on time but the girls were not ready to go.  One had no make-up at all and I needed to thicken Allie's liner (cat eyes.)  Also, because this was the first time wearing these costumes some adjustments needed to be made so that everyone on the team looked alike.  I had their hair in high ponytails but a majority of the girls were wearing the hair bows like cheer bows so I had to pull their ponies up to cheer height.

So I did manage to get the girls ready in time and I have the other dance moms to thank for helping with costume stuff.  We all help each other out because we know that if one dancer doesn't have her hair/make-up/costume like the others, the team could lose points and what would that prove?

The big candy dance walked away with a gold award (highest in this competition was high gold), a special judge's award and a trophy for best costume for level 2.  There's a whole big back story to those costumes so the fact they won an award was just fantastic.  We have a couple of weeks off and then we're gearing up for two more competitions.