About Us

At Aurora Dance we believe in the power of movement, expression, and creativity, we nurture the connection between body and soul, and we create a professional and fun learning environment specifically designed for young dancers.

Through our classes, students will be given the opportunity to improve fine-motor and physical skills such as coordination, body awareness, stamina, and balance, whilst also allowing for creative expression and movement development. We encourage students to learn at their own pace in a welcoming and inclusive environment. All children are invited to participate in our classes regardless of their confidence, skill level, or gender.

Ballet

"The Royal Academy of Dance is one of the world’s most influential dance education and training organisations, with its global headquarters in London. We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn to dance."

We offer classes in classical ballet classes for all ages through the RAD (Royal Academy of dance.

The RAD’s patron is Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II and our President is Dame Darcey Bussell, DBE. With 13,000 members in 89 countries and offices in 36, we have an incredible global network of passionate and skilled employees, teachers and members, each shaping and influencing the future of dance.

Our higher education programmes are regulated and a recent Ofsted inspection found the RAD to be an ‘outstanding’ provider of initial teacher education. The RAD’s examinations are recognised by Ofqual and contribute to UCAS points.

There are currently over 1,000 students in full-time or part-time dance teacher training programmes and each year the RAD’s renowned classical ballet examination syllabus is taught to thousands of young people worldwide, with around a quarter of a million pupils per year going on to take our exams.

Established in 1920 by a group of eminent dance professionals representing the leading ballet styles of the period with the aim of improving the standards of dance teaching, initially in the UK, our founders would be proud of their legacy.

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To learn more about the Royal Academy of Dance

Click Here

Jazz, Contemporary, Acrobatics and Musical Theatre

We offer Jazz (Jazz Addict), Contemporary (Lucidity), Acrobatics (Agility) and Musical Theatre (Encore) classes in Junior, Intermediate and Senior levels through the Asia Pacific Dance Association (APDA)

"Our mission is to inspire dance students and teachers worldwide. We do this by providing regularly updated, comprehensive syllabus choreography via online tools and teaching resources. These learning tools, combined with the personal service and support of the APDA office, enables teachers to deliver quality syllabi with confidence."

Dance studios across Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Macau, China, Thailand, Taiwan, South Africa and the United Kingdom offer the APDA dance curriculum.

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Meet the Team

Aurora Dance Studio team 2024

Owner/Opperator

Shannon Nuttall

Teaching the community to love the art of dance over the past 11 years has been a strong passion of mine, I enjoy watching my dancers go on a journey of self and technical development in the studio and in the real world. I love working with other local creative businesses in Selwyn, to help build performing arts in our community.

Teacher

Laura Walker

Laura has been dancing since the age of 8, beginning in jazz and eventually branching out into all styles including ballet, contemporary, hiphop and musical theatre. At the age of 16 she began training as a junior tutor, and ever since she has loved being a part of her students’ dance journeys. She has trained in and taught many different syllabi including BBO, NZAMD, RAD, ATOD and APDA.

Teacher

Nickie Tabukovu

Nickie has been working and assisting with Drama workshops for over 10 years, creating a lot of experience with children ranging from 5 years to 15 years old. Nickie graduated with a first class BA (Honours) in Drama and Theatre studies in July 2016 and has also received a distinction in Musical Theatre Grade 8 from the London College of Music.

Teacher

Maia Cook

This year Maia is a year 13 student at St Andrew’s college and will be her last year of dancing with St Andrew’s ballet company. She will be working towards completing solo seal in 2024 which is the last exam involved with St Andrew’s College dance.

In the future Maia is looking into studying early child education as she enjoys being surrounded with the energy of younger children and very much enjoys her time with our younger dancers.

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Teacher

Lucy Dunnlogan

Lucy is currently in year 13 at Rolleston College, you will see her around in our Jazz, Contemporary and Musical Theatre classes. Lucy also runs solo and team choreography classes for local dance competitions.

Lucy also runs her own dance photography business 'Dynamic Dance Photography' so if you see her at local dance competitions make sure you say hi!

Teacher

Olivia Lloyd

Olivia has been dancing since the age of 3, she has studied many forms of dance through her career including classical ballet, modern jazz, tap and contemporary.

After dancing with Aurora Dance Studios for 3 years Olivia is joining the ADS teaching team for 2024, with a focus in contemporary and Acro.

In Olivias spare time she enjoys taking part in community theatre shows (CSR Chicago and Mary Poppins, Kirwee Players Singing in the rain) and is also involved in a medieval reenactment group. Olivia loves sewing her own clothes and even the odd dance costume too!