Newport Beach students get into step with kids with developmental disorders through ‘Connect Dance’
On a late Sunday morning, the sound of laughter and music spills out of the clubhouse at the Bonita Creek Park on La Vida.
Inside the small, one-room building, kids laugh and scream and sing along to their favorites. They coordinate small dance moves with one another as parents watch on warmly from the sidelines and chat among themselves. Eventually, the music comes to a slow lull as Jessica Grace calls the students to attention along with her cadre of about five teachers — varying between the ages of 16 and 18 — to answer the question of the day: “What’s one thing you like to do on Saturdays?”
This is the morning routine for Connect Dance, a free dance class led most Sundays for children with developmental disorders by their teenage instructors from Newport Harbor and Corona del Mar high schools.
A core group of friends lead the dance class, including Newport Harbor students Emma Chaix, Chandler Green, Olivia Winberry and Alexandria Schachter, joined by Rio Haupt, who attends Corona del Mar.
“I’m not a dancer,” Chaix said, laughing during a recent interview. “I was a competitive gymnast for 11 years. I’ve done things similar to dance, but I’m not a dancer. But I’ve always loved to dance, and it’s also something that’s very expressive.”
Chaix said her little sister has a rare disorder, Kabuki syndrome, and that she herself has been interested in working with kids with varying ranges of abilities for some time. But, she said, it wasn’t until after she made friends on her school campus with a student named Maya that she realized just how detached students with disabilities can be from the student body as a whole. She noticed they rarely attended pep rallies or other events.
“It’s sad to me that they went to school and then went home,” she said. “I work with an organization called Friendship Circle [a nonprofit that works to provide social, recreational and educational programs to children and young adults with disabilities], and they have different classes and sessions with kids.
“So, I used my connections with Friendship Circle and my motivation to allow these kids to become more involved.”
Chaix said the small team had been divided between naming the class “Connect Dance” or INC, short for inclusion and kindness, but they decided to go with Connect, as they wanted to both highlight the connection of children with disabilities to the greater community but also refer to how people can connect with their bodies, themselves and their emotions through dance.
Newport Harbor sophomore Olivia Winberry said her little brother, Asher, has autism, and she wanted to give him a place to go to hang out with other kids. Asher participated in the class on Sunday, counting off the initial dance practice with a loud and cheerful “five, six, seven, eight!”
Asher, who is in sixth grade, said he liked going to class because of the girls on the dance team. His favorite parts were the yoga stretches that started the day and the games they played between learning routines.
“The dancing and stuff [is fun],” he said.
Alexandria Schachter, the only high school senior in the group, said she grew up providing assistance to students with disabilities. Her father teaches special education classes at Corona del Mar High School, so she has spent a lot of time with the community.
Junior Rio Haupt said the minute she heard about the class she wanted to be a part of it.
“Dance for me, I’ve done it since I was 5,” said Chandler Green, 17. “It’s been an outlet for my entire life in so many different ways, so I feel like I wanted to bring that to these kids. It’s just really special that we get to do this, so I just feel really honored and really proud that we’ve created this because I think for the kids it really means a lot. We all wanted to make a space where they could be free.”
McCoy Painter, a senior at Corona del Mar who describes himself as having “a little bit of autism, not too much,” leads the stretches and described the opportunity to participate in Connect Dance as “amazing.”
Painter said he hopes to become a dance instructor in the future, adding that he currently offers a yoga class at Sling Body Fitness every Saturday afternoon.
“I love the people. I love the dances. I love the games here; it’s just awesome to get to know everyone and all that,” Painter said. “It’s been awesome [to meet other high schoolers], actually. I’ve been getting a lot of stretches from my school classes and my workout classes.”
Jessica Grace, who founded Social & Kind and works regularly with children with developmental disorders, said she helped structure the class and guides the girls through instruction after being put in touch with them through the Winberrys.
“When you open up these kind of events to the public, you never know what kind of delays and differences you’re going to get, and there’s been some challenges along the way,” Grace said. “There are, of course, some kids who have a really hard time or it’s loud or whatever it is, I’ve been able to guide them and support the girls. A lot of these kids suffer from some social anxiety.
“So, this already is our fifth or sixth time meeting, and it’s amazing to see the difference of how even their ability to remember in sequence the dance steps has been so great to see, and powerful,” she added.
Grace said dance involves motor movement and allows kids that are more shy to come out of their shells.
“You get the smiles and the laughter. Even if they’re not following the steps correctly, it’s just meeting their sensory needs as well,” she added. “That naturally emotionally regulates them, which is really something I’m passionate about educating more people on. Sometimes, we need to involve movement and brain breaks to get kids to express and use their language. That part is so powerful with dance.”
“Really, it’s about socialization. At the end of the day, these kids don’t get enough social opportunities. They’re not the kids that are invited to hang out on Saturday nights, and some of them are on spirit league, different sports teams, but those only meet once a week,” said Grace. “This class has just been a great opportunity — we hope to keep it going through the summer too.”
Grace said it was awesome to see students like Chaix, Green, Schachter, Winberry and Haupt organizing a dance class but noted that the community lacked people who could help empower others to start social groups and encourage them to keep going with them.
“A lot of times, kids will try to start something, and then they’re really overwhelmed because one kid has a behavior or one kid doesn’t follow directions or they take it personally if someone’s not participating,” she said. “To me, that’s our missing link, and everywhere, but especially in this community, we should have more people like me educating and empowering students on inclusion and [understanding].
“That’s the power of neurotypical models. That’s really what inclusion is; we like to just say we’re inclusive, but we need so much more growth around that and, to me, it all starts from support and education.”
For more information about the class, email connectdanceco@gmail.com.
Updates
11:14 a.m. May 15, 2023: This story was updated to clarify that it was a team effort to establish the dance class.
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