CORE ACADEMY STAGES
Each Stage of the Core Academy covers elements in the following categories:
Strength, Fitness & Flexibility
Floor Elements & Agilities
Rebound/Vault
Apparatus: Bars &Beam
Most children under 7 will benefit from starting at Stage 1 unless they have a year or more worth of experience on another program.
Children aged 8 & 9 can usually start at Stage 2 (choose a 6 years+ class).
Beginners aged 10 or over may start in Stage 3 (choose a class for 8 years+) and can work toward this level within that class.
STAGE 1
SUITABLE FOR: Gymnasts age 5 - 7 years whether beginners or with some experience of gymnastics
Most children aged 5 - 7 years will benefit from beginning in STAGE 1 to help them understand and master the key building blocks for efficient and safe gymnastics movement.
At STAGE 1, young gymnasts will learn the basic shapes, positions and core movements required for gymnastics. They will begin to learn about posture and flexibility and will begin to learn and work toward some key gymnastics skills such as rolls, handstands and cartwheels. On apparatus, gymnasts build up their strength, balance, co-ordination and confidence by completing activities that develop all of these attributes in an accessible way.
To Graduate Stage 1 and move onto Stage 2, gymnasts must show competence in the Stage 1 Graduation elements as well as having achieved enough other elements to obtain their Stage 1 Gold award.
STAGE 2
SUITABLE FOR: Gymnasts age under 8 who have Graduated Stage 1. Beginners who are 8 years or older.
Most children aged 8 - 10 years will benefit from beginning in STAGE 2 to help them understand and master the key building blocks for efficient and safe gymnastics movement.
At STAGE 2 the work on shapes, positions and core movements continues, with an emphasis of beginning to ‘put it all together’ into tangible gymnastics skills. Rolls are improved and developed, handstand and cartwheel work is progressed to encourage a sound understanding of the sequences of movement. On apparatus the focus is on progressive skills to enable them transition to the Stage 3 syllabus.
To Graduate Stage 2 and move onto Stage 3, gymnasts must show competence in the Stage 2 Graduation elements as well as having achieved enough other elements to obtain their Stage 2 Gold award.
STAGE 3
SUITABLE FOR: Gymnasts who have Graduated Stage 2. Beginners or Improvers who are 10 years or older.
Beginners or improvers aged 10+ who join at STAGE 3 may begin with some Stage 2 work to help them understand and master the key building blocks for efficient and safe gymnastics movement.
At STAGE 3, gymnasts are expected to already be able to confidently perform a range of core gymnastics skills including rolls to stand, handstands and cartwheels. From this level onwards they will focus a little more on maintaining the good shapes they have learned at Stages 1 & 2 whilst performing core gymnastics skills. Working toward good technique which will enable them to progress and increase their repertoire of variations on these skills. Flexibility begins to play a greater role in the achievement of sound technique in these skills. The challenge at Stage 3 is to produce quality movement patterns within all of the core gymnastics skills in order to facilitate progression through to the Stage 4 syllabus.
To Graduate Stage 3 and move onto Stage 4, gymnasts must show competence in the Stage 3 Graduation elements as well as having achieved enough other elements to obtain their Stage 3 Gold award.
STAGE 4
SUITABLE FOR: Gymnasts who have Graduated Stage 3. Improvers upon assessment.
By Stage 4, gymnasts should have good over-all strength, flexibility and co-ordination as well as a sound understanding of the techniques that will help them build on this to work toward intermediate skills. Stage 4 is focussed around perfecting techniques and diversifying the elements such as mastering different start and finish positions (entry and exit) for skills like cartwheels, learning to link elements together smoothly with grace and control. All of this provides the basis for skills on the intermediate syllabus. This is also the case for apparatus work with some of the work focussed on building part-skills so that the full skill can be put together at Intermediate Stage.
To Graduate Stage 4 and move onto Intermediate, gymnasts must show competence in the Stage 4 Graduation elements as well as having achieved enough other elements to obtain their Stage 4 Gold award. They must also be ready for the style of teaching and coaching on the Intermediate & Advanced classes including willingness to perform preparation and conditioning sets every week to develop fitness, self-motivation to follow the program to get the best out of it, and readiness to understand the importance of safe and sound progression.
INTERMEDIATE
SUITABLE FOR: Gymnasts who have Graduated Stage 4. Experienced Gymnasts upon assessment
At Intermediate level, we move on from CORE SKILLS to BASICS and PRE-REQUISITES. Intermediate is a stepping stone to Advanced Gymnastics so it is necessary to have mastered the CORE skills and attributes in order to then use those abilities to work toward Intermediate elements. Intermediate elements allow the gymnast to safely progress to the Advanced program as we introduce the gymnastics ‘Basics’ and ‘pre-requisites’. ‘Basics’ and ‘pre-requisites’ are terms used to describe the skills that gymnasts must be able to perform in order to progress to the next level of skill. At this level they include things like cartwheels & rolls (with different entries & exits), balanced handstand, round off, walkovers, splits, 3/4 somersaults, flics etc. For tumble or vaulting, these would also include things like correct rebound technique combined with different arm actions and body shapes as well as simple rotational elements. For Bars & Beam gymnasts develop a range of skills that, when put together, could form a routine of ‘Basics’, e.g. mounts, dismounts and various things in between.
The award Scheme for Intermediate & Advanced program followsthe same principle as the Core Academy (see below) with the addition of INdividual apparatus / discipline certificates. This allows gymnasts to also focus on specific areas if they wish to and therefore can move on to the next level in their chosen area without the need to graduate on all elements. It is therefore common for gymnasts in these classes to have more than one level of booklet 'on the go' at a time.
Achievement Awards
At each Stage there are between 34 and 36 assessable elements and 4 levels of achievement: Bronze, Silver, Gold and Graduation
BRONZE Award (any 6-10 elements achieved) : Certificate
SILVER Award (any 16-20 elements achieved) : Certificate
GOLD Award (any 22-30 elements achieved) : Certificate
GRADUATION Award (ALL Graduation Elements plus Gold award) : Certificate & Medal
The Graduation Award requires specific key progression elements (Graduation Elements) to be completed. These elements are those which have the greatest impact on readiness for the next Stage. To ensure the appropriate level of fitness and understanding, graduates must also have achieved enough elements overall to qualify for the Gold award.
Certificates can be purchased when gymnasts reach each milestone. When the gymnasts achieve the Graduation Award, this also comes with a Medal (a different one for each Stage). When they have achieved the Graduation Award it is time to move on to the next Stage so you should enrol in the next Stage at re-enrolment.
Gymnasts are assessed for the award schemes during weeks 3 through 9 of each term (sometimes assessment may continue in week 10). We log and communicate the gymnasts latest achievement level in time for re-enrolment on the next term.
Please note, if a gymnast is absent for 3 or more weeks of the term, particularly if these fall within the assessment period, they may find they do not have enough new elements signed off to attain the next level of award. If you desire a separate assessment please email us at the usual address and we will endeavour to arrange this.