My question is partly inspired by another thread where the dad opted for privates as a kind of supervised practise. I think I'm kind of doing the same but wonder if there are better options?
My 7 y/o used to skate but has lost interest for now. My little one is 4 y/o (5 in a couple mths) and still in that initial 'obsessed with skating' phase. She's doing 2 x 30 min group lessons and 2 x 15 min privates pw (spread across the week). The groups are pretty large and have a big age range so she's a bit lost there, plus gets paired with the other little one (6 y/o) who's a bit of a bully so not ideal. But it's cheap so we persist. We arrive 20-30 mins before the privates so at least she's warmed up.
4 y/o is actually pretty good about spontaneously figuring out on her own what to practise (she'll get bored with slalom so move to crossovers, then get bored with that and move to one foot glides, etc). Although she's pretty mindful of others around her, neither of us are confident for her to practise backwards things. So the biggest hole in her practise is doing all those things backwards. Public sessions are not an option (way too crowded with rough hockey boys) so I'm not allowed to get on with her.
So here's my questions:
1) Are there better ways than privates to get supervised or safe practice (for all that backwards stuff);
2) For those lucky sessions when there's not many others on the ice (does happen - we skate mornings) - how do you help a non-reader to make the most of their ice time?
3) If 4 y/o is too young to practice effectively (please say it is!!
) - at what age should you expect children to do some effective practise on their own and how do you teach them to do it? (7 y/o's "practise" was pretty random and not effective).
4) Do you think 4 y/o skates too much? I'm not worried about her losing interest any time soon - but wonder whether we should save our $s for when she's a bit older and likely to progress a bit quicker.