Dear Parents, Pupils and Teachers

I do hope you are well and had a good Christmas. My thanks to those who have sent lovely emails thanking me and the teachers for last term. These comments were so very much appreciated.

We had all been looking forward to returning to our classes in the studios from the 9th January but sadly, once again, we are not permitted to do so. For the time being we shall have to resume all classes (excluding Tiny Tots), via Zoom. I have communicated with all teachers and they have promised to all be on their A Game with providing tuition and enjoyment for all ages. I feel it is so very important to keep JMDS students participating, learning, having fun and progressing as well as maintaining contact with their JMDS friends. I can assure you that myself and my teachers will make every effort to make the classes the very best they can.

Miss Vanessa is unable to travel up and down to Nottingham where she taught from last term, and is also unable to teach from her home at the present time. Miss Hollie will temporarily take over Miss Vanessa's Wednesday classes and Miss Emma will temporarily take over the Thursday classes. Miss Vanessa will most certainly be back as soon as she can, hopefully after half term, and will miss her JMDS teaching.

To help make our Zoom classes as successful and enjoyable as possible please try to follow the following suggestions:

Teachers are responsible for sending out Zoom invitations.

Please do check you have the invite and link at least 2 hours to the start of class. Although JMDS teachers are the best in Town, it can be difficult if they are already teaching to start emailing at the same time.

Please try to ensure that your child has the best space available in the house for their class/classes. Bedrooms are not particularly favourable (as I have seen a child swinging on her bunk bed), but if you have other children in the house then this is an understandable situation (but not the bunk bed swinging).

Parents and other family members should not be in the room for classes unless the children need help with viewing/hearing the teacher.

For tap classes, if you haven't got a tap board please nip down to B & Q and buy a sheet of cheap wood - it's far more rewarding than tapping in socks!

Please do not let your child keep taking sips of drinks and eating snacks during classes. They won't starve or dehydrate in 30 minutes. Hopefully.

It would be appreciated if all students were dressed in their JMDS uniform - this will all help with a sense of class normality. I shall be popping on to check!

I have discounted all the classes by 10%. Please do check the fee/timetable information so that you can pay the reduced amount into my account. Should we return to classes in our halls and studios before the end of term, there will be nothing further for you to pay.

I now come to our Imperial Society examinations, which I had planned and booked for 11th and 12th February. I had a list of children who were going to take their tap grade examinations and also a list of seniors who would have been taking their vocational Intermediate exams in ballet and modern. Very sadly, these cannot now take place. The ISTD are suggesting that I move these exams to Easter. No examiners are being booked. Also, under Tier 4 rules we are not allowed to run booster classes, or even have the exams take place. For the vocational candidates there would be no chance of them passing the examinations without a huge amount of work in a proper studio. I know that some of our seniors are relying on their Intermediate exams to be able to move forward with teaching qualifications and college entry requirements and I would suggest contacting the relevant organisations to find guidance as to how you can move forward.

On the bright side, after much nagging on my part to the Director of ISTD Examinations, I have the tap certificates from last March. I also have medals for our British Arts Finals solo and duet finalists and the reports and certificates from the recent modern, drama and mime exams. I am just awaiting British Arts exam medals and then I can get started on the mammoth task of collating all these. Goodness knows when I will be able to get them to our students!

Here's to us all taking a nice deep breath, putting our JMDS smiles on, heads up and carrying on.

Sending you all my best wishes,

Miss Jayne

Miss Jayne Wilson, AISTD (Dip), Fellow & Examiner of The British Arts, Principal Jayne Marie Dancing School