Pasco County Schools Testimonial

February 21, 2012

To Whom it May Concern,

Pasco County’s before and after school child care program, “Pasco Learning and Activity Centers of Enrichment” (PLACE) participated in Moscow Ballet’s “New Horizon’s–A Children’s Program for Life” in December of 2011. We arranged for the children of all 26 PLACE Centers to experience the innovative and hands-on three pronged initiative espousing healthy movement, dietary and creative expression.

PLACE brought over 1,300 elementary aged children to the day of immersion which includes a full performance of Moscow Ballet’s Great Russian Nutcracker and they loved it. The program began the day before when the children were read the unique Nutcracker story and created Nutcracker hand puppets.

At the theatre the next day, the children were totally engaged in the three pronged program. They executed movement exercises modeled for them by the 30 professional dancers, they learned about good dietary guidelines, they created interactive puppet play with their bodies and their own puppets and with story lines, too. The culmination of the experience for them was seeing the professional dancers, sets and costumes portraying the beautiful Great Russian Nutcracker story. At the end of the 5-hour session, all the children leaped enthusiastically to their feet clapping and cheering!

We were so pleased with the results of this day of immersion that we are bringing four Moscow Ballet dancers to the PLACE centers for 6 weeks this summer where we will expand to a full week of immersion for every PLACE child in Pasco County!

Exposure to acclaimed performances such as Moscow Ballet’s Great Russian Nutcracker helps PLACE bring the highest quality experiences to our children. In addition to that, the personal role modeling by the talented dancers in teaching the program’s movement and dietary guidelines is a major plus not to mention their exposure to a new and vibrant world culture.

We highly recommend Moscow Ballet’s “New Horizons–A Children’s Program for Life” as an effective teaching and learning experience for all children. Please contact me with further questions.

Sincerely,

Mary Grey
Supervisor of Child Care Educational Programs
District School Board of Pasco County
7227 Land O'Lakes Blvd., Land O'Lakes, FL 34638
Phone: (813) 794-2180 Fax: (813) 794-2187
Email: [email protected]