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A figure skating refinement specialist improves all aspects of a skater’s performance, from the most basic warming-up exercises, to the delivery of a fully-fledged performance. Roselle's lessons are based on refining the purity of a skater’s movements and contain the following steps:
- Improving a skater’s overall look & carriage across the ice by enforcing correct posture & body alignment which must be maintained while performing stroking, spins, jumps, footwork, field moves and choreography. The most common things that need refinement are: Focus of the eyes and head; hand & arm positioning; correct shoulder, core & leg placement; proper use of knees & pointed toes.
- Learning to project self-confidence and a winning aura through body movements and facial expression. Learning how to skate confidently, starts with the way you carry yourself on and off the ice.
- Learning to captivate an audience by using specific tools of presentation and style. Creating interesting moves both in and out of the program that highlight the skater’s technical and artistic strengths.
- Learning to skate with emotional attachment and portray different styles of music and dance. This will be achieved through the use of various improvisation skills & choreographic exercises. The skater will learn how to become one with the music. For best results, a combination of off-ice & on-ice work is suggested.
- Ability to command respect & attention from fellow competitors, audiences and judges through the energy given off by the skater, from the moment they step onto the ice.
- Finally, putting it all together into a program, and refining every movement within that program. Learning to skate with the music, not beside it, and learning to project movement upward and outward.
There are many other areas that Roselle addresses. For instance, skating skills and footwork: A coach may desire more arms to be added into the footwork section of a program, or alternate spiral sequences. She also works on refining jump preparations, entries, and landings, as well as helping the skater to find new spin and spiral positions unique to their body type. If a skater has problems keeping good posture, she will work on stroking until improvements are seen.
She strongly believes in always returning to the practicing and perfecting of basics, even for the most advanced level skaters. Although style is a predominant theme in her teaching, she still enforces speed, power, strength, endurance and flexibility, as they are all equally important factors in the development of a good quality skater.
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