Stretching

Before you dance the most important thing to do is stretch. If you dance when you are not warmed up, you can really injure yourself. The easiest way to warm up is to do some simple pliés. These will warm up your knees and thighs. If you are dancing on pointe shoes you want to warm up your feet. Do some prances in place and roll your ankles around. This warms up the ankles and your whole foot. Also if you’re in pointe shoes you want to warm up your knees.  For any dance class deep lunges help the hips and the thighs. Also sitting on the floor in a straddle and reaching to either side really helps you to get warm fast. From there roll through your splits and hold in each split for about one minute. This also helps if you do not have your splits. To get your shoulders warm just roll them back and forth. Same thing with your neck just roll it back and forth slowly. Make sure you do these stretches every time before dancing so you will not get hurt. If you are just standing around in dance make sure you move around so you will not get cold again.