As a dancer, it's always fun to branch out and try different styles and forms of Dance. Most recently, I joined my school's step team. The team is student run, and meets only once a week. I assumed Step would simply be stomping and clapping to different rhythms. After one practice, my opinion about step team was permanently changed. To start the practice, the team captains demonstrated a new step, which looked fairly manageable. 45 minutes later, everyone on the team was only just beginning to understand the sequence.
However, knowing the order of the moves was the easy part. In order to have a cohesive sound, everyone had to be extremely focused in order to be synchronized. Concentration was key for step team in order to ensure each sound was correct. While stepping could be physically demanding, it was also a mental workout.
It was important that everyone had each step mastered, as we were getting ready to perform at a school assembly celebrating black history month. We had long rehearsals on weekends and the night before the show. During these rehearsals we all found ourselves sweaty and tired after stepping. We had to repeat steps countless times until they were performance ready, which was no easy task. Sometimes we all did the steps too fast and other times people left out sounds. Whenever this happened we would all have to really concentrate to ensure our
mistakes didn't happen again.
By this point I could never believe how I used to think Step team was simple. When the assembly rolled around, all the hard work paid off and step team's performance was greeted with thunderous applause. Step team ended up being yet another example of how difficult, an rewarding, dance can be.