Program teaches ballet to the visually impaired

The students she's been teaching don't have much use for reflective surfaces. They're blind or visually impaired, and if anyone's been looking into the mirrors, it's the seeing-eye dogs tied to the balance bar.

“I was pretty terrified to teach these classes,” said Chianese, an administrator with the Oklahoma City Ballet. “However, once I taught my first class, I knew I could approach things normally. The only difference is I express more things verbally.”

Last year, New View Oklahoma teamed with City Arts Center and the ballet to offer a week of dance instruction to visually impaired children. This year, the groups received funding from Devon Energy to teach a six-week course to adults and children.

The final class in the Devon Energy Movement Without Limitations program was Thursday.

Six visually impaired women and four children, including a boy, learned ballet movements and combinations — the same moves professional dancers use during their daily warm-ups, Chianese said. Spacing the classes one week apart gave participants a chance to practice on their own time, improving their skills.

“Ballet is all about the vocabulary of dance,” she said. “They learn the vocabulary and perfect it. The more vocabulary they learn, the harder it becomes.”

Do they enjoy it?

“I talked to one of the participants,” said Mary Ann Prior, executive director of City Arts Center. “She said she'd discovered muscles she never knew she had!”

Prior borrowed the idea for the class from the Royal Ballet in London, where she lived until about two years ago. The English dance company, in turn, had taken the idea from a New York studio.

“It's a great program for people who don't get a chance to exercise because of the physical constraints of their conditions,” Prior said. “Dancing is something they're not confident about doing unless they have a completely safe environment.”

The dance studio at City Arts Center provides that environment. Under Chianese's guidance, the students do the rest.

“They're a joy,” Chianese said. “They're so enthusiastic. They love it.”

Child participants were allowed to bring sighted partners to help them out, she said. Upon learning that, one child's mother decided she wanted to participate. The rest followed suit. By the end of the course, the children were dancing with their parents' help, everyone involved having a great time.

“I've had every single student in the class express to me how much they would like it to continue,” Chianese said.

The future of the program isn't clear, though. Prior said she hopes to offer the classes each spring and fall but currently lacks the funding. Transportation to and from class has been difficult for some students; having that service provided also would be helpful.

“It's very close to my heart,” Prior said, “and I really want to keep it going, building on the benefits that we've already achieved.”