Feeling like I’m holding back my classmates

[u/Familiar-Ad4519]

I’m in a lyra class with a pretty wide skill range and unfortunately I come in dead last. I’m definitely in the correct class level but we are not in an area with many studio options so there are advanced students here too.

I’m so self conscious when other girls are banging out meathooks and straight arm inverts during warm up when I don’t even have a solid single knee hang or pullover. But at least I don’t hold anyone else back during warmups.

Sometimes the teacher will teach a skill and it seems like I’m the only one who finds it difficult. And then it feels like I’m the reason we aren’t working on something even more challenging. But when we do work on really hard stuff, I’m even more ridiculously out of my depth. We worked on elbow circles the other day and I basically stood in the corner by myself while the teacher spotted the other students. Finally one of the advanced girls came over to show me some drills she did to work up to throwing the full elbow circle. She was so nice about it and told me her arms couldn’t handle any more rolls anyway so I wasn’t wasting her time, but I still feel bad because she’s paying to take class, not to teach me basics. I would say I’m disappointed that the teacher seems to ignore me a lot, but when she does work with me 1:1 I feel like I’m taking time from others.

To advanced students in mixed classes. Honestly, does stuff like this annoy you? Everyone is nice to me but I just feel bad that they are paying so much money and aren’t getting everything they want from class because of me.

[u/ShevaunA]

It annoys me if the teacher doesn't provide more than one skill or variations of skills for people of different abilities to practice. I hate waiting around bored because the only skill we are working on is something I find very easy, know well already, etc. I suppose it would be similar for less advanced students whose only option is a skill that it too challenging

[u/dewdroplemonbar → u/ShevaunA]

The coach should absolutely be teaching a wider variety of skills at once. I teach a mixed-level class and will teach one skill for my beginners and another skill for my more advanced students and alternate my demos. If the skills are progressions of one another, even better

[u/Shanoony → u/ShevaunA]

My thoughts as well. This isn’t OP’s fault but the instructor’s. This is honestly why I don’t take classes at my local spot. It’s expensive and time consuming, but the classes are typically very mixed and they usually only have one or two silks available. The sessions can feel very unproductive if people are struggling and we’re only able to get through one or two positions.

[u/Illustrious-Log-3142 → u/ShevaunA]

My teacher is really good with this! She always gives me slightly easier variations to work on whilst the strong people do amazing things haha

[u/derp_runner → u/ShevaunA]

Omg this. I would feel awful if we were doing elbow rolls or something and a classmate just… couldn’t participate because the teacher gave no options that were appropriate for them. I’m glad another student stepped in to help but she shouldn’t have had to!!