Hints and Tips for Beginners

Q: Do I need to come to every beginner class?

No, you do not have to come to every class (and there are three of those for the beginners). UCT Ballroom is not here to make dancing a chore, nor is it here to take over your studies or your social life. Dancing can be done at your pace, so keep on enjoying yourself as much as possible. That said, it is important to come to at least one class a week and coming to two is beneficial if you want to do better and if you want to meet different people.

Q: How do I practice dancing?

Come to your classes and make sure you attend socials. They are fun, free and conveniently take place at UCT. They also involve some creative freedom and artistic expression – you get to dress up. The socials coordinator would also appreciate any help decorating the hall.

We also have extra technique classes just before medal tests and intervarsity, which are useful to learn to dance with your chosen partner and to learn to improve your technique.

Q: What is the one thing a beginner must always do?

Learn the basic step properly, no matter how repetitive it may seem. When you reach intermediate level you will soon see why. It is not enough to know how to do a step; it is equally important to learn how to lead it (boys) and follow it (girls). It also takes time for your feet and your muscles to adjust to the steps. Lastly, it is a great for exercise! If you are not tired after a class, then you aren’t working hard enough.

Q: Why does it take a whole year to learn five dances?

Your body will adjust to dancing over time. Doing exercise on heals (for both men and women) takes some getting used to. Your muscles learn to stretch and adapt and your feet harden and callous. Your core muscles will also have to adjust to a better posture, as will your upper body adjust to the Ballroom and Latin hold.

For men, learning to use the floor in order to lead (by pushing off from the floor when stepping) is something that you can’t learn overnight. It takes conscious effort and practice.

Q: What are some of the things you must remember when dancing?

Remember to use your floor
Remember to brush your feet
Remember that you should take every opportunity to dance
Remember to have fun, because it will make your dancing look great

Q: What is typical dancing etiquette?

A woman is never supposed to turn a man down, except when tired or when she has promised a dance to someone else.
A man should be courteous when asking a woman to dance and both partners should thank one another afterwards.
A man is supposed to be showing off the woman at her best. Difficult moves and poor leading skills will not achieve this.

Other things to remember:

You are allowed to ask more advanced dancers to dance. Just make sure that they understand that you are a beginner!

Swop partners constantly, this will improve your dancing immensely because you never know what your new partner will do. You are here to learn a skill, which involves learning how to dance, not what to dance.

Plaza Week 2011

Plaza Week, during the first week of the University calendar, is the best opportunity for us to recruit you! Did we succeed? I think so. It was certainly fun, encapsulating the atmosphere of dancing which we try to maintain throughout the dancing year; even during those oh-so-serious moments of medal tests and intervarsity.

That is what dancing at UCT Ballroom and Latin Dancing Society is all about, fun! As clichéd as it sounds, if you stop having fun, stop meeting people and stop enjoying the social aspect of dancing, then you need to reassess why you are dancing in the first place.

Getting involved is usually all it takes, just like the plaza week volunteers realised. If you were there you would have seen some (rather tired) but smiley-happy up-beat people, who are there to promote the thing that they love and believe in. You may have seen Nic and Mirada spinning in circles around the plaza, or the sweet and steadfast Leigh behind the desk. I hope you got a chance to meet some of the committee, because we are here to serve you.



If you signed up with us, thank you. We hope to make dancing mean to you, what it does to us. Dancing is many things and UCT Ballroom will give all of these to you, if you open your mind and allow your feet to follow the process.

Dancing means meeting new people all the time
Dancing means learning a life-long skill
Dancing means learning floor craft and spatial awareness
Dancing is good exercise
Dancing increases your enjoyment and your confidence in all kinds of dancing
Dancing means having fun

I want to thank all the people that came to help during plaza week:
Mirada, Nic, Rudi, Leigh, Neann, Kamla, Thandeka, Alicia, MJ, Michelle and all the Catherines and Katherines

Thanks too to the committee who made themselves available to do demos, hand out flyers and keep the spirit upbeat and happy.