Welcome to the wonderful world of figure skating.  The annual Rhinelander figure skating show is coming up fast. It will be held in March. Watch your local listings for details, and check the website. On the Friday of the show it is specifically for schools. NCSS is coming to watch and support us.   Everyone in skating is excited about the show. We do two shows every year. We have a Christmas show the day after Thanksgiving and then we have our spring show in March. We have themes every year. Last year’s theme was “Skating Through the Decades.” This year’s theme is the “Wonderful World of Figure Skating,” and we will be skating to a variety of different Disney songs and medleys. All of us skaters work very hard and practice at least twice a week. We work on our routines for competitions and shows and learn new moves. Most of the moves we do are jumps and spins. All of the skaters are split into two different groups. The new skaters start off in Basic and every so often they test out to move up to the next level. To pass a level you have to be able to do all the moves required to move up. Basic skills has 8 levels and the higher up you go the harder the moves get. The more experienced skaters are in freestyle. Freestyle has more advanced moves than basic skills and is split into two parts, low freestyle and high freestyle. We perform our best for our audience and always enjoy performing for you.
We interviewed two skaters, Samantha Rosendahl and Joyce Hauser. Both Samantha and Joyce are 6th graders at NCSS. We asked them the following questions:
Q.  How long have you been skating?  
A. Joyce: “I have been skating for three years.”  
Samantha: “I have been skating for six years.”  
Q.  What is your favorite part of skating?
A. Joyce:  “I like being with my friends outside of school and traveling around the state for competitions.”  
Samantha: “I like skating with my friends and creating fun routines!”  
Q.  How did you get into skating?  
A. Joyce: “I heard my friends talking about skating and it seemed fun.”  
Samantha: “I went to one of the shows to watch my older sister and I decided I wanted to try skating.”  
Q. What is your favorite part of the show?  
A. Joyce: “I like the costumes and the routines.”  
Samantha: “I like the hair, makeup, and the costumes.”

We hope that you learned a little bit about figure skating and are able to make it to our show.