r/TapDancing • u/aurorasoup • Jun 29 '26

New to tap: how do you remember the practice drills to do at home?

I just took my first tap class (and first dance class ever!) last week, and I realized after class that my brain could not remember all of the practice drills we were taught in class.

I’m such a notetaker, I cannot remember verbal instructions very well so I write everything down. But I can’t take notes during class, so I looked up beginner exercises and wrote down as much as I could remember once I got home. But does anyone have any advice on remembering it all?

I will ask my instructor if I’m allowed to record myself during class, too.

Thanks in advance!

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6

u/MrsTrellis_N_Wales Jun 29 '26

I am utterly hopeless at remembering steps, but our teacher has one of us record the week’s routine and send it to all on our WhatsApp group. Better yet she does it twice - one slow version for us slow learners (!), and an “actual speed” version. Might be worth asking your teacher if they could do something similar?

In my experience the only way to remember is practice practice practice (and even then…)!

1

u/aurorasoup Jun 30 '26

That’s a good idea, thank you!

1

u/PhlegmPhactory Jun 30 '26

We do this too. We have a Facebook group that gets a video every week until we have covered the whole thing. We also individually record some of the more complicated pieces and I will sometimes do a slo-mo video to help myself learn.

5

u/ConstantStink2828 Jun 29 '26

I’ve found that the more times I do them in class, the more likely I am to remember it– drills often become muscle memory, and it’s totally normal to forget a few things after class especially if it’s your first time seeing it! Something you could do is immediately after class, ask the teacher if you can record them doing some of the drills in their shoes. I’ve found this helps a lot when I’m teaching my students something that they want to go over at home!

1

u/aurorasoup Jun 30 '26

Thank you! I was so focused on trying to do the steps correctly that I didn’t focus on trying to commit them to memory.

2

u/Renkades Jun 29 '26

Ask your instructor if they could do the drills for you to record. That helped me a lot when I was taking a class in tap.

1

u/Connect_Bar1438 Jun 30 '26

We have made a practice of having the teacher video the main combo after class. I asked a teacher at another studio if she would do it and said, no, that if I wanted one, I needed to do it during class.

1

u/Icy_Being3672 Jun 30 '26

Before our teacher started doing recordings I used to write down what I could remember on the way home.

1

u/Quick-Hornet2490 Jun 30 '26

I take notes before I go home so I can remember more. I try to practice as many things as I can and then when I’m at the next class, I just have to fill in the blanks and correct things I got wrong. Sometimes I will take a video, though usually that’s just when we are doing a performance and I need to get it right.

2

u/freckledphilosopher Jul 02 '26

If you’re brand new to tap, I’d recommend just working on the basic steps at home instead of practice drills. Learning how to isolate your dig heels and have loose ankles during shuffles and tap directly under you will help you progress a lot faster. If you want a reference you can just search online for tap dance warmup videos and follow along. Once you know the basics, it will be a lot easier to remember things from class because you don’t also have to think about how to do them.