End of the Year Spectacles!
June-July 2006. France is no different than California, the end of the school year is full of performances, recitals and activities.
#1 Cirque (cirus) Zoe loved her Cirque class in which she learned to jump over a ball, balance on a beam, juggle with scarves, and basically have fun acting silly. She was one of the only girls in the group and was with her good friend and love, Arnaud. (I did hear from her on the last day of school that she told him they are just friends now). I think what she liked most about him was that he she would clasp her hands by her heart and he would do the same and then fall to the ground at her feet as though he was worshiping her. What girl wouldn't like that !!
A few pictures from Cirque.
Jumping over the circus ball
Walking the tightrope with waving scarf through her leg
OCCITAN PERFORMANCE
In addition to French, Zoe-Pascale has been studying Occitan, a very important language that about 30 people in the world speak (just kidding). Seriously it is a language and culture being revitalized in the south of France. It is a language that was spoken years ago by the people in the south from Spain to Italy. It sounds like a mixture of French, Spanish, Italian and some Latin. She loves it and feels it is an important part of her education! She is a lover of languages and luckily has the ear for it like her Dad. Here are some pictures from the Occitan performance.
The kids singing to their hearts content!!!
DANCE PERFORMANCE
This year Zoe-Pascale enrolled in ballet Clasique - the true traditional classical ballet which calls for a great deal of discipline and hard work. The teacher told us in the beginning of the year that these next two years are the most difficult as the kids have to learn technique. Once they learn the true basic techniques they can take more advance classes and do anything well in modern and jazz. In addition, the teacher Lillianne was a former ballerina in the Paris ballet and has very high expectations. As we learned she was right. It was hard work and discipline and a few tears. However Zoe did fantastic! She knows the classical ballet steps of Pas de Bourrée, Glissade, Battement , Deggagé and many more. She danced beautifully at the performance except they forgot to tell her their would be lights as a result she couldnt' see us and got a bit scared and a few tears dropped. The dance however was beautfiul. Here she is in her costume.
End of the School Year Fete
. During the school year each class had 3 months each of Theatre, Cirque and Pottery. Since you can't exactly perform pottery, each class did a performance of Cirque or Theatre. Her class did Cirque which of course she loved as she had been doing it after school as well.
PONEY CERTIFICATION
PASSING GALLOPE 1 
Turning around in her Saddle
Taking Poney is a serious business in France as we have found out. (I think may extracurricular classes are more serious than we realized). Dressed in English riding clothes, boots and hat she looked great which of course is also important.
Throughout the year she learned how to take care of the poney, brush and clean her and make her shine. She knows how to trot, gallop, stop, pass another horse, turn around in her saddle and more.
At the final performance a woman from the National Horse certification board came all dressed in a wool jacket with badges attached (in the middle of 100 degree weather) to test the group and award a certification of passing the first level.
We aren't sure if she wants to continue, but we know she had fun and learned a lot and we feel if she ever wants to rent a poney or horse on vacation she will truly know how to handle the horse. Unlike me who never quite learned but loved to ride. 