Helpful Hints for Couples Learning to Dance:

At Alegria Ballroom Dance Academy, we specialize in teaching couples to social dance.  Teaching couples is different from teaching individuals and requires special care.  Learning as a couple can be more challenging than learning to dance as an individual.  Teachers are trained to make learning fun and easy, and you can help by remembering the following:

Let your teacher do the teaching.

This means you should try to avoid finding fault with each other, which can be distracting.

It’s not how many steps you know, but how well you dance them.

Learning too many steps too soon results in bad habits and frustration at not dancing them properly.  You can always recognize good dancers on how they move together, not by how many patterns they do.

In teaching couples, we have learned that men typically progress slower because they have more to think about when leading and tend to be more analytical or mechanical.  Women, on the other hand, tend to be more emotional and feel movement quicker.

Keep your lessons close together.

Dancing is a learned skill, and just like any other skill, it takes lots of practice!  Ideally, each visit should be kept less than a week apart.  This will aid you in making a speedier progress.

Maximize your learning curve with a combination of private lessons, group classes, and practice opportunities!

Communicate with your teacher.

This will help him or her know what to teach you and the way you would like to be taught.  The more we know about your dance needs, the better we can plan your lessons.

Learning to dance is an investment that keeps paying back.  Of all the hobbies you may have, dancing will go with you wherever you go for many years to come.  The two of you will become better and better dancers while you continue to have fun and spend time in each others arms.