For The Teacher Who Second-Guesses Herself

Teach Every Class With Confidence

The Acro Circle^™

What do I teach next? Is she ready for this? Am I moving too fast?
You shouldn't have to guess.

Most acro teachers are piecing this together by trial and error. You plan the class, you hope the order is right, and underneath it there's always that quiet worry you've skipped a foundation, and that you won't discover it until much later. The Acro Circle is where that stops. Inside it is the Premiere Comprehensive Program for Acro Dance, and it will have you walking into any acro class knowing exactly what to teach, in what order, and when. The curriculum, so you know what to teach. The lesson plans, so you know what comes next and why that order. The readiness markers, so you know when she's ready and when she isn't. A coach, so you know who to ask. Nobody waiting, nobody pushed ahead of their ability... and certification, when it comes, simply puts a name to the confidence you built getting there.

Join the Acro Circle See the Pathway

Start where you are · self-paced or with a coach beside you · know what to teach, and why

Acro dancer mid-aerial inside the Acro Circle ring emblem

Watch The Film

Step Inside The Circle.

These teachers were asking themselves the same questions two years ago. Here's what changed, and what it feels like to teach without that weight.

Read This Slowly

The questions running through your head every single class.

One of them wants to work on her back handspring. Another one is asking what a bridge is. You get about one month where everyone's on the same page, and after that the divide opens up and never really closes. What do I teach next, and to which half of the room?

She wants to try it away from the wall because she "does it at home all the time," and you haven't seen it land safely once. Her mum is asking about aerials. Is she actually ready for this?

You can see the gaps in the technique. What you can't always see is where they're coming from, or how far back you'd have to go to fix them. Am I moving too fast? Did I miss something underneath?

And then the quiet one, mid-class, mid-spot. Is this how I'm supposed to be teaching it? Is this how the other teachers spot it? Do I look silly right now? Are the parents watching? I hope not.

What The Acro Circle Actually Is

A home where acro teachers belong.

If you recognised yourself up there, the first thing worth saying is that you're not a bad teacher. That is simply what acro does when there's no system underneath it. Here's what changes. You get a proven curriculum across three levels, Junior, Intermediate, and Advanced, with the lesson plans already written and the progressions already in the order that keeps bodies safe. Nothing is left to your best guess on a Sunday night. You study a level before your students reach it, so you're never learning the material the same week you're meant to be teaching it.

And the questions a plan can't answer, a person can. We don't leave. For as long as you're teaching acro you'll have the system, the plans, teachers who've stood exactly where you're standing, and if you want it, a coach in your corner. There are no silly questions in here, and that matters more than it sounds: you need somewhere you can not know something yet and have that feel completely okay. So when something isn't working in third period, you ask, and you walk into next week knowing what to do differently instead of guessing twice.

Certain on Monday,
and every Monday after that.

And this is the part that matters most. When a teacher isn't sure, safety is one of the things she isn't sure about. When the progressions are clear and the readiness markers are written down, no child gets pushed into a skill her body isn't ready for. Foundations first, every time, because going slower is how you end up going faster.

Welcome to teaching with confidence.

What's Inside

Everything That Comes With Knowing.

Look at this list as a list of questions you'll stop asking yourself. At the heart of it is the Premiere Comprehensive Program for Acro Dance: a complete teacher-training syllabus across three levels, Junior, Intermediate, and Advanced, where each level hands you the full curriculum, the written lesson plans, and the training to teach them. Around it sits everything else a working acro teacher needs. It takes the guesswork out, and it means you stop reinventing the wheel every September.

The Premiere Comprehensive Program™

Know what to teach, and what comes after it. Across three levels, Junior, Intermediate, and Advanced, you get the full syllabus, the complete lesson plans, the textbooks, and the teacher tools for every one of them. The right skill, in the right order, at the right time, already worked out. You never open a blank page again. In Coaching & Certification, teacher-training walkthroughs of every lesson plan show you how to teach it before you stand in front of the class.

The Acro Circle™ Community

Know you're not the only one. Post a question at 10pm and wake up to answers from teachers who have stood exactly where you're standing. Nobody here will make you feel silly for asking, because every one of them has asked it. This is where "I'm not sure" turns into "here's what worked for me."

Live Level Group Coaching Calls

Know who to ask. Bring the student you can't quite read, or the skill that stalled out on Tuesday, and leave the call knowing what to change on Thursday. Real coaching on your actual classes, with the coach for your level.

Coaching & Certification tier

The Preschool Acro Program

Know what to do with a room full of four-year-olds. A complete early-years program from 18 months (assisted) through age 6, across three stages: Toddlers, Preschoolers, and Pre-Juniors. Its own full syllabus and lesson plans, the same depth as the three main levels, so your littlest classes get the same certainty as everyone else.

Your Certification Pathway

Recognition of the confidence you've built. Finish the level's lesson plans, log your practical teaching hours with your own students, then apply and sit the exam. It isn't the reason you came, it's the receipt for what changed, and your first one can come as soon as your first year.

Coaching & Certification tier

The Testing Day Exam Kit

Know that the parents can see it too. Rubrics, certificates, and parent materials to run your own student evaluation days in your studio, like a karate belt test, with no outside examiner required. Progress stops being something you have to describe at the door.

The Assistant Teacher Training Program

Know your assistants are teaching it the same way you are. A ready-built training program you run in-house to bring your junior staff up to the ADTA standard, on your timeline, so one teacher's class isn't safer than another's.

Clear Milestones & Hours

Know where you stand, not just where you're headed. Clear milestones at every level, with your practical teaching hours counting as you teach them, so you can see yourself getting better the whole way through instead of waiting until the end to find out.

Coaching & Certification tier

The Quarterly President's Workshop

Know the things nobody writes down. Four times a year with Melissa Klassen: Preschool Acro implementation, Testing Day strategy, rolling out the Assistant Teacher Training Program, and the judgment calls that only come from decades in the studio.

Coaching & Certification tier

All of this comes with Self-Guided and Coaching & Certification. The items marked Coaching & Certification are the human layer on top: the walkthroughs, the live calls, the President's Workshop, and the certification pathway. Nothing here is an add-on, and nothing here costs extra. Acro 101 is its own twelve-week beginner season, the gentlest way in, and it sits alongside these two in the offer below. What follows is the road it all sits on, level by level, so you can see exactly where you'd start.

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The Pathway

You Always Know What Comes Next.

The Premiere Comprehensive Program runs across three levels: Junior, Intermediate, and Advanced. Each one is taught online and put into practice in your own studio, with a real class at that level. Everyone starts at Junior, which covers roughly the first three years of a student's acro training. The syllabus for all three levels is open to you from the day you join, so the moment a student needs higher-level material, you already have it in front of you instead of hunting for it. That's what a roadmap actually does for you: you can see the whole road, you can see exactly where you're standing on it, and you can see whether anything got skipped along the way. Having the material is not the same as being certified in it, so certifying at Intermediate or Advanced is a separate step you take later, if and when you want it. From there you only go as far as your students need you to. Most teachers stay at Junior and Intermediate for years, right where their studio is, and that is exactly as it should be. Advanced is there for the teachers who want to become master acro instructors, with students training at a pre-professional level.

Where You Start

The Junior Level

You teach a beginner acro class · roughly a student's first three years

What's Inside This Level

Three Technique Warm-Ups

Building the strength, flexibility, and prerequisites every trick stands on.

Examples of Skills Taught

Headstands, handstands, cartwheels, chest stands, elbow stands, front walkovers, back walkovers, and tinsicas.

Partnering Skills

Introductory partner work: counterbalances, supported balances, and learning to safely connect, support, and trust a partner.

Across-the-Floor Acro Dance Combinations

Traveling combinations that link this level's skills with simple dance steps across the floor, teaching acro as dance from the very first class, not just isolated tricks.

Milestone Check-Offs

Recognized progress markers as you move through the level.

Where it leads → Junior ADTA Certified

If You Continue

The Intermediate Level

The next three years of student work · for teachers who want to carry on

What's Inside This Level

Three Technique Warm-Ups

Deepening core and upper-body strength, developing the back flexibility and active splits the bigger skills demand, and conditioning the body for controlled inversions and aerial and back handspring work, so the harder tricks are built on a body that's ready for them.

Examples of Skills Taught

Illusions, side aerials, and round-off back handsprings.

Partnering Skills

More dynamic partner work: bigger counterbalances, supported inversions, intermediate lifts, and partner-assisted skills where two dancers learn to move as one.

Across-the-Floor Acro Dance Combinations

Across-the-floor sequences that weave the intermediate skills together with dance steps, turns, and transitions, building the musicality, phrasing, and flow that make acro read as genuine dance.

Milestone Check-Offs

Recognized progress markers as you move through the level.

Where it leads → Intermediate ADTA Certified

For Master Instructors

The Advanced Level

For teachers becoming master acro instructors · students training at a pre-professional level

What's Inside This Level

Three Technique Warm-Ups

Building peak strength, power, and explosive control: the advanced flexibility, dynamic conditioning, and body preparation behind safe front aerials, back tucks, pikes, layouts, and the highest-level tumbling in the syllabus.

Examples of Skills Taught

Front aerials, back handspring combinations, round-off back tucks, pikes, and layouts, and the highest-level tricks in the syllabus.

Partnering Skills

Advanced partner work: complex lifts, dynamic transitions, partner-assisted aerials, and the high-level supported skills that define a polished acro-dance duet or group routine.

Across-the-Floor Acro Dance Combinations

Full across-the-floor acro-dance combinations that blend the hardest skills with advanced choreography, dynamics, and performance quality, where the technique disappears into the dance and the audience simply sees artistry.

The Senior Male Acrobat

An additional skill set built for your senior male acrobats.

Mental Game for Advanced Acrobats

Working through fear, mental blocks, and the head-game behind the biggest skills.

Milestone Check-Offs

Recognized progress markers as you move through the level.

Where it leads → Advanced ADTA Certified

The Safety Gate

Nothing here is earned by watching. Every milestone comes through real practical teaching hours with your own students, which is exactly why the certainty you end up with is real and not borrowed. The hours can't be rushed, and that is the point.

Recognition Along The Way

You don't wait a year to feel different. Your next class is better, because you'll know what you're doing in it, and you hit recognized milestones as you go. Progress stops being a hamster wheel you can't tell you're moving on, and starts being something you can actually see.

You Go As Far As Your Students Need

There's no pressure to climb. Junior on its own is a complete year's work and a real credential, and many teachers spend years at Junior and Intermediate, exactly where their students are, which is exactly as it should be. Advanced is there for the teachers becoming master acro instructors, whose students are training at a pre-professional level.

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How Certification Works

How You Earn Your Certification.

So that's the road. The fair question is what actually earns the credential at each level, and the honest answer is: teaching, watched closely, over time. Certification here isn't the reason to come and it isn't a thing you can hurry. It's the recognition of the confidence you built along the way. Here's exactly how it works in the Coaching & Certification tier.

Self-Guided is self-study: the whole system and the community, with no coaching and no certification pathway.

50 practical teaching hours per level

Counted as you teach real students, because teaching is what builds the judgment. Each level: 50 hours. That's roughly one dance season of a 1-hour-per-week class, so if you're teaching one acro class at that level through the school year, your hours add up naturally while you work.

An implementation class in your studio

Junior requires a beginner acro class, recommended ages 7+, no more than 10 students. Intermediate requires an intermediate class, Advanced an advanced class. What you're being credited for is the teaching, not the watching.

Live group coaching on your classes

The question you'd otherwise be guessing at, answered by a person. Bring the trick that isn't clicking or the student you can't quite read, and work through it with the coach for your level.

Milestone check-ins along the way

You never have to wonder whether you're doing it right. Each level includes milestones that confirm you're on track as you move through it.

A level exam · 80% to pass

Score 80% or higher to certify, and you'll know what's on it before you sit it. If you don't pass, you can retake as many times as you need. Your coach gives you a study guide and prepares you first. There's no rush and no ambush.

A pace that's genuinely yours

You certify per level, as you master it, never against a clock. Experienced teachers with students at multiple levels can work two levels at once, just talk to us first. More than two at once isn't recommended. Mastery takes time, and we honor that.

Three Ways In

Choose How Much Support You Want Beside You.

Every door here opens into The Acro Circle. What you're choosing is how much you need in front of you right now. If the only acro you teach is beginner classes for six to twelve year olds, Acro 101 is one twelve-week season with a starter credential at the end of it. If you want every answer written down, preschool through professional, that's Self-Guided: the full Premiere Comprehensive Program for Acro Dance, the curriculum, the lesson plans, the progressions and the readiness markers, worked through on your own. And if you'd rather have someone to ask every step of the way, and a certification at the end of it, that's Coaching & Certification. Start at any door and move up whenever you're ready.

Immediate Access

Every way in starts with a free 7-day trial.

Everything opens the moment you join: your level, every lesson plan, your coaching and your certification pathway. You can plan this week's class today, and you won't be charged until day 8.

Acro 101

For the teacher whose acro classes are all beginners. One twelve-week season, and a credential you earned by teaching it.

^$25/ month · USD

Month to month

What you get

The complete Acro 101 season. A ready-to-teach twelve-week beginner curriculum for ages 6 to 12: the lesson plans, the video tutorials, the instructor's manual, the illustrations, and the student progress charts
Your Acro 101 Teacher Certification. Teach the season, log a minimum of twelve practical teaching hours signed off, then sit the open-resource exam. Earned by teaching, and once it's yours it stays yours
The Acro Circle community. Bring your questions any day of the week, to teachers walking the same road
A clear next step. When your students outgrow the season, Acro 101 hands you straight into Junior, the first level of the Premiere Comprehensive Program
Self-guided. No live coaching, and this is the Acro 101 curriculum rather than the Premiere Comprehensive Program or the ADTA certification pathway.

Join Acro 101

✦ Free 7-day trial · Cancel anytime

Self-Guided

Every answer written down, preschool through professional, worked through at your own pace.

^$497/ year · USD

or $49 / month

What you get

The full Premiere Comprehensive Program. Junior, Intermediate, and Advanced: every lesson plan, textbook, and teacher tool across all three levels, with the progressions already in the right order so you always know what comes next
Study at your own speed. The whole library is open the moment you join, so you can plan a term, a year, or just next Tuesday
Self-paced. No live coaching, and no certification pathway.

Join Self-Guided

✦ Free 7-day trial · Cancel anytime

★ Most Teachers Choose This

Coaching & Certification

Everything, plus someone to ask. Walk into every class knowing what to teach and why.

^$997/ year · USD

or $97 / month

What you get

The full Premiere Comprehensive Program. Junior, Intermediate, and Advanced: every lesson plan, textbook, and teacher tool across all three levels, so you never plan a class from a blank page again
Teacher-Training Lessons. Walkthroughs of every lesson plan that show you exactly how to teach it, so you've already seen it done before you stand in front of the room
Live Level Group Coaching Calls. Bring the thing you couldn't crack this week and leave knowing what to change, with a coach who has taught it a hundred times
Your certification pathway. The proof, once the growth is real. Junior covers roughly the first three years of a student's training and most teachers complete it in ten to sixteen months, then you certify each level after that as you master it
Quarterly President's Workshop with Melissa Klassen, on the judgment calls nobody writes down
Clear milestones so you always know where you stand, with your practical teaching hours counting as you teach them

Join Coaching & Certification

✦ Free 7-day trial · Cancel anytime

And each of these answers something you've been working out alone

The Preschool Acro Program. A full early-years curriculum, 18 months (assisted) to age 6: Toddlers, Preschoolers, and Pre-Juniors
The Assistant Teacher Training Program. A plug-and-play way to train your assistant teachers in-house, to your own standard
The Testing Day Exam Kit. Rubrics, certificates, and parent materials to evaluate your own students in-house
The Acro Circle community. The end of teaching acro alone: bring your questions any day of the week, to teachers walking the same road

Included with Self-Guided and Coaching & Certification. Nothing here is an add-on and nothing here costs extra.

And for the teachers who already know this is their life's work, there's a Lifetime option: one payment, in for good. Just ask, and we'll tell you about it.

Try it free for 7 days. Every way in opens with a free trial, so you can read a level, open the lesson plans and see the room for yourself before you decide anything. You won't be charged until day 8. After that there's no contract and no lock-in: cancel anytime, and if the time comes that this isn't serving you and your students, you close it out yourself in a couple of clicks. And if you'd rather ask a real question before you join, send us a note, and we'd far rather answer it than have you wondering.

How It Works

Built Around Your Studio.

Choose Self-Guided or Coaching & Certification, and everything opens the moment you join. Immediate access, nothing drip-fed, so you can plan this week's class today.

Study the Level Ahead

Learn the level before your students reach it, so you're never teaching something you're still working out yourself an hour beforehand.

Teach In Your Own Studio

Walk in with the plan already made, and teach it. When something surprises you, and it will, there's a coach and a room full of teachers to ask that same week.

Certify As You Master It

In Coaching & Certification your hours and milestones add up while you teach. Then you apply and sit the exam, and the credential names what you can already do by then, at your pace.

A Letter From the Founder

Why The Long Road.

Melissa Klassen spotting a student through an arch at the barre

I've been teaching acro for over thirty years, and teaching acro teachers for fifteen of those years. In that time I've watched this industry rush. I've watched teachers put in front of children before anyone had shown them how to keep those children safe. I've watched students get hurt, sometimes seriously, by teachers who were told they were ready when nobody had actually taught them the progressions.

And I'll tell you what I don't say often enough: in the beginning it was embarrassing. I was in my twenties, intimidated by my own teenagers, and genuinely frightened that the studio owner thought I was a hack, and that the parents in the lobby thought so too. Nobody got hurt, but that was luck as much as anything, and I knew it. So I took the road of hard knocks and built the systems myself, alone, with no community and nobody to call. That took me about ten years. You don't have to spend those ten years, and that is rather the point.

I built the Acro Dance Teachers Association so that no teacher would have to figure this out by guessing. There is no shortcut to teaching this work safely. There just isn't. You can learn a syllabus in a few months. You cannot learn to teach it in a few months. That takes hours in the studio with real students, real progressions, real mistakes, real corrections.

A teacher came to me eight years ago. She was twenty-eight, ran her own studio, and was terrified of teaching acro. Qualified to teach jazz and ballet, standing at the edge of acro like it was a cliff. She wasn't sure she could do it... she didn't have a background in acro. I gave her the curriculum, the methodology, and my coaching. She put in the years. She's still with me. She's since moved into a new building and doubled the size of her studio, with four acro teachers on her staff now, one of whom used to be a parent watching from the lobby.

That's the work. Not a syllabus, not a chart. A real road, walked over years, with someone who will still be there in year seven when you're hiring your fourth teacher and bringing her into the program the way you came into it. And this place stays. I built it, I still run it, and I'm still teaching. The home you join is the home that'll be here.

The Acro Circle is the home I wish had existed when I started. It's structured but flexible. It's serious but supportive. And what it really gives you is the thing I didn't have: you stop guessing. Not on Monday, not mid-spot, not on a Sunday night with a blank page in front of you. The credential comes too, and it means something to you, to your studio, to the parents who trust you with their kids, but it comes because you grew into it. You don't wait years to feel the value. You teach better next week. The years are simply how long we stay in your corner.

And there's one more thing I wish I'd had: my people. When I started, I was the only one in my area, in my whole part of the country, who knew how to teach acro. It's hard, and so few people do it well, that I spent years figuring it out alone, with no one to call when I got stuck. What I needed back then was an Acro family: a community who understood, who had my back, who could help me as I learned, grew, and worked toward mastery. That's the part I'm proudest of now, and it's the part you'll never have to go without. You won't be doing this alone the way I did.

If that's the kind of teacher you want to be, I'd love to have you in the family.

Miss Melissa

Melissa Klassen · Founder & President · ADTA

You don't have to keep figuring this out on your own.

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From The Family

Teachers Walking The Same Road.

I had no experience teaching or doing acro myself. I needed a program that could give me proper support and break things down for someone without a bunch of experience. It's been worth every penny. My students have developed beautiful technique that looks very safe and strong.

Alison Rutz

Studio Owner · AMR Dance Studio · Drumheller, Canada

What I love about ADTA is it's so focused on building strength for the skills versus just trick training. The syllabus guides us through what drills to use and how to progress skills carefully, and it empowers us to say, "we need to go slow to get the strength for the skills." We've grown from 20 dancers when I started to 65 now. I'm seeing more confidence in our dancers, and acro skills showing up safely in their jazz and hip hop choreography too.

Michelle Rogers

PT & Acro Dept Head · Maddox Dance Studio · Oregon, USA

Having people teach you how to spot your children safely — it's so helpful to have teachers really give you the confidence to be confident for your students. With the tricks my dancers are learning now, the technique is already there from the foundation, so the next skill just looks better the first few times they try it — rather than the ones who come in saying "hey, I learned this in my backyard," and it looks kinda scary. Now that I've had enough time to see my little ones become my big ones, it's really cool to see them take that foundation forward.

Courtney Smith

Studio Owner · Standout Dance Collective · Unity, Canada

This can be what your Mondays feel like too.

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Questions Worth Asking

Frequently Asked.

When does it start, and how soon can I dive in?

The moment you join, you get immediate access to the full program. Nothing is drip-fed and nothing is held back, so you can plan your next class the same day. Study ahead, map out your term, and move at your own pace from day one.

What's the difference between the three ways in?

Acro 101 is the starter door: one ready-to-teach twelve-week beginner season for ages 6 to 12, with its own starter credential earned by teaching it. It's built for the teacher whose acro classes are all beginners right now, and it bridges up to Junior when her students are ready for more. The other two both give you the whole Premiere Comprehensive Program: every level's lesson plans, textbooks, and teacher tools, along with Preschool Acro (18 months assisted through age 6), the Assistant Teacher Training Program, the Testing Day Exam Kit, and the community. Self-Guided is that whole system, walked on your own. Coaching & Certification adds the human layer: teacher-training walkthroughs of every lesson plan, live group coaching on your real classes, the quarterly President's Workshop, and the certification pathway. Put simply, Self-Guided means you always know what to teach. Coaching & Certification means you also have someone to ask. Certification lives only in Coaching & Certification. Everyone starts at Junior.

Is the program online or in person?

Both, in the way that matters. The full system (curriculum, lesson plans, progressions, and the live group coaching) is online, so you study at your own pace from anywhere. The teaching itself, and your practical hours, happen in your own studio with your real students. What builds the ability, and what earns the certification, is real classroom teaching rather than screen time.

Should I pay annually or monthly?

The bigger decision isn't annual versus monthly. It's how much support you want beside you. Once you've picked Self-Guided or Coaching & Certification, the billing is simple: annual is the better value, one investment in your year rather than another monthly bill, and monthly is there if you'd rather start smaller and see how it fits. Either way, you can cancel anytime.

How long does the whole thing take?

The Acro Circle is your home for as long as you're teaching, so there isn't a finish line you're waiting on. You work through each level as you and your students are ready, then keep growing, always at the pace your students set. If you're working toward certification, here's what's typical, depending on your experience and how quickly your students progress: Junior usually takes ten to sixteen months, and each level after it runs on a similar rhythm. There is a minimum of ten months on every level, because each level has ten monthly lesson plans and you teach your way through all of them. You certify each level as you master it, never racing a clock.

How fast can I actually get certified?

Everyone starts at Junior. How quickly you certify depends on your experience and how fast your students progress. Most teachers complete Junior somewhere between ten and sixteen months, with a minimum of ten months on every level. It's mastery-based: finish the level's lesson plans, log your 50 practical teaching hours, then apply and sit the exam. Worth saying plainly though: the certificate is the last thing to arrive, not the first thing to change. Your classes get better in the first month. (Certification is part of the Coaching & Certification tier.)

What if I'm new to teaching acro?

The Junior level is built for exactly that. Many of our teachers came in from ballet, jazz, or contemporary with little or no acro background. You work through the lesson plans step by step, and in Coaching & Certification, walkthroughs of every lesson plan show you how to teach each one before you stand in front of the room, with the live calls and the President's Workshop there for whatever the plan didn't cover. You don't need to be an acrobat to teach acro safely. You need a system, someone to ask, and time.

What if I'm a gymnastics, cheer, baton, or figure skating coach?

You're welcome here, and you wouldn't be the first. Plenty of our teachers come from adjacent fields like gymnastics, cheer, baton, and figure skating. The strength, flexibility, and skill drills built into the work carry over to every sport, so whatever else your students do, this makes them stronger, safer athletes. Alongside the acro skills themselves, the biggest benefit across the board is the body conditioning. Your background gives you a real head start on technique and spotting, and we teach you the rest.

What is the Assistant Teacher Training Program?

It's a whole program inside The Acro Circle for once you're established and starting to need student helpers. It's a plug-and-play "train your student teachers" program you run yourself, in-house. Your assistants work through it and earn a certificate at the end, brought up to the ADTA standard on your timeline, which means your whole studio ends up teaching the same way instead of each teacher improvising her own. Most teachers introduce it after about a year of teacher training, once they're ready to grow their staff. We also have options for whole studio teams. Reach out and we'll work out what fits.

How do the practical teaching hours work?

Each level requires 50 hours of practical teaching, counted as you teach a real implementation class at that level. 50 hours is roughly one dance season of a 1-hour-per-week class, so if you're teaching one acro class through the school year, your hours add up naturally while you work. They can't be rushed or faked, and that's the point: hours in front of real students are what turn a plan into judgment. Every level also runs a minimum of ten months, because each level has ten monthly lesson plans and you teach your way through all of them.

Can I work on more than one level at once?

Yes, if you have the experience and you have students at those levels to teach. With five or more years of acro teaching experience, you can work through Junior and Intermediate together. With more than five years, you can apply to take on all three at once. We'll be honest with you though: more than two levels in a year is intense, and we don't recommend it for most people. Either way it needs our okay first, and every level still runs its minimum ten months. Talk to us and we'll plan it with you properly.

What if I want a break between certifications?

Take one. Plenty of teachers certify a level, then sit with it for a season before starting the next, and you have three ways to do that. Stay in Coaching & Certification and keep coming to the group coaching calls while you teach. Move down to Self-Guided if you just want to keep the system and the community while you take a breather. Or cancel altogether and come back when you're ready for your next level. Whichever you choose, the certifications you've already earned stay yours permanently. They don't lapse, and you don't sit them again.

What if I need more time on a level?

Take it. The library is at-your-pace, and your membership stays with you for as long as you're teaching. You learn the big picture in theory, and if your students need longer in practical hours, you simply stay on that level longer. There's no penalty and no rush. Your students set the pace.

What's the level exam like, and what if I don't pass?

You need 80% or higher to certify, and you'll know exactly what's on it before you sit it. You get a study guide inside the program, and your coach prepares you first. If you don't pass, you can retake as many times as you need. The goal is mastery, not a single-attempt pass or fail.

Is there a Lifetime option?

Yes. For the teachers who already know this is their life's work, there's a one-time Lifetime option, in for good. For more information, reach out to us and we'll get you set up.

What if I'm not sure it's the right fit?

Then come and look. There's a free 7-day trial on every way in, so you can open the lesson plans, read a level, and see the room for yourself before you decide anything. Choose Coaching & Certification for your trial if you want to see the coaching and the certification pathway too, since that's the fullest view of what's in here. And once you're in there's no contract and no lock-in: you can cancel anytime. If you'd rather just ask a person, send us a note and we'll get on the phone with you. We'd far rather answer your real question than have you wondering from the outside.

One Last Thing

Somewhere right now, a teacher is teaching acro to a child.

She should not be guessing at the progressions, or the spotting cues, or whether that child is ready to go upside down without her hands. She should know. And she shouldn't have to work it out alone on a Sunday night.

That teacher can be you, and it can start this week. The Acro Circle is where the guessing ends, and it's still here in year seven when you're the one training the next one. The door's open. Come in.

Join the Acro Circle

Miss Melissa

Certification is earned, not bought.

The Acro Circle is the professional home for acro teachers, from the Acro Dance Teachers Association, the global hub for Acro dance teachers. Inside, the Premiere Comprehensive Program for Acro Dance is the curriculum, the lesson plans, and the certification pathway you work through. Three ways in: Acro 101 ($25/month, a twelve-week beginner season with its own starter credential), Self-Guided ($497/year or $49/month) and Coaching & Certification ($997/year or $97/month), which is where certification lives. A one-time Lifetime option is available on request. Every way in opens with a free 7-day trial, and you get immediate access the moment you join. The Junior, Intermediate, and Advanced certifications are earned through real teaching: finish the level's lesson plans, log your practical hours, then apply and sit the exam. They live in the Coaching & Certification tier. Prices shown are current and may change for new members, but once you join, your price is locked for life, for as long as you stay.