Difficulty: Easy

Safety Warning: Only try this move if you have access to a proper trapeze. Get somebody to spot you and work with a mat underneath. Make sure you are confident with front balance and work through each part slowly at first.

Jono shows you how to do a mini two-part aerial trapeze routine – front balance to half angel. These trapeze moves are both quite straightforward so here you will learn to transition between the two!

First, get into front balance, either by doing a pullover or another way. Once you’re there, make sure the bar is sitting just below your hips and that you feel comfortable and secure in this position.

From here, reach up and place one hand on the rope with your thumb pointing up towards the ceiling. Reach the other hand across your body and place it on the bar with your thumb pointing towards you. These thumb positions are important for having a good grip when you roll over, so make sure you’ve got it right.

When you have a good grip, slowly tip your body onto the diagonal, turning towards the rope that you are holding. Your head will be travelling towards the floor, and your legs will move up towards the rope that is furthest away from your head. The back of your knees should be in contact with this rope. As your legs make contact with the rope, start to twist through your hips.

Keep the rope nice and high on the back of your legs – this will allow you to turn over slowly. As you do, the rope will slowly travel around and down your legs, so that you can eventually hook your feet onto the rope. As you go, slide your hand down the rope so that you can keep lowering yourself.

Flex your feet so that you have a nice firm grip on the rope, and bring your hand off the other rope and stretch it towards the floor. This creates a single mermaid shape. From your mermaid, bring down your top leg and stretch it towards the floor – this creates your half angel shape.

When you’ve been through each move slowly, you can practice transitioning more smoothly. Keep your grip strong and your contact points secure at all times to polish your front balance to half angel!

You can see all our aerial videos by tagging ‘aerial’ on our Youth Circus Home Edition library page here.

Difficulty: Easy

Safety Warning: Only practice aerial tricks if you have the proper aerial equipment at home. Always practice aerial tricks with supervision and protective matting below you.

In this tutorial, Jono shows you how to do a simple trapeze/hammock trick: layout to cradle! Jono demonstrates on a trapeze, but you can easily translate this trick to hammock as well.

To get into a layout, start by sitting on the bar in a sideways position against one of the ropes, with the rope running right up the centre of your back. Place one hand above your head with your thumb pointing down (as if you’re scrubbing your back with a brush!)

With your other hand, hold the rope in front of you at about eye level. Bring your outside leg up and place your foot flat on the rope in front of you, at the same point as your hand. Move this hand out of the way to the rope behind you, again with your thumb pointing down.

Position the rope between your shoulder and neck and start to slowly push the other rope away with your foot. As you do this, push your shoulder back into the rope behind you until your leg locks into a straight position. Your bum will start to lift off the bar, allowing you to bring your other leg up and on top of the leg that is already on the rope. When you’re in this position, continue to push and lift your hips to a nice straight-body position. If you are feeling confident, you can take your hands off the bar and pose!

To move into cradle, keep your legs straight but slowly dip your hips on one side of the bar into a v shape. Keep the rope high on your back as a contact point. Relax your knees to fold over the bar/ropes and lean your head back as another point of contact.

To get out of cradle back to sit, reach your outside hand across to the opposite rope. Hold the near rope with your other hand, and pull yourself across to sit.

Now that you’ve learnt how to transition from layout to cradle, practice switching between the two!

You can see all our aerial videos by tagging ‘aerial’ on our library homepage here.

Difficulty: Hard

Safety Warning: Don’t put any weight on your ‘silk’ – this is just designed to help you practice the wrap! If you are lucky enough to have a proper silk at home, only practice this move if you’ve done it before in class as it’s an advanced move.

Maddie shows us how to practice an advanced silk wrap at home, to take us from S Lock to Curly Wurly. This is perfect if you don’t have your own silk at home!

If you’ve not quite got to this move yet, don’t worry – you can still practice on the ground and it will help when you get to practising it in class!

Once you’ve locked one end of your material to a drawer, or door handle, lie back on the floor to make your silk shape.

To start your S lock, you start in a catchers wrap. Maddie reminds us how to get into this (you can watch her separate video on catchers if you’re not sure) and then shows us how to get into S lock.

Then, Maddie demonstrates going from S lock into curly whirly wrap – from this, you’ll be able to drop in a star shape. You can practice rolling out of this – watching Maddie’s elegant demonstration to help you!

S Lock to Curly Wurly is really useful to try at home, so that when we’re back in class it’s fresh in your mind. It’s also useful to try this one whilst you’re not actually upside down!

You can see all our videos and activities here.

Difficulty: Easy

Safety Warning: This is pretty safe when you’re practising on a chair, but if you’re lucky enough to have your own equipment at home make sure you are practising safely.

Maddie shows us how to practice aerial footlocks at home, using just a chair and a long piece of fabric. This is perfect for all the aerialists who are currently stuck on the ground!

You’ll need a long scarf or other piece of material – you could tie a few scarves together, perhaps. Sitting on a chair, with one end over your shoulder to make your ‘silk’ hang vertically, you’ll use a French wrap to start your foot lock. If you need to revise your French wrap, used when you do French climbing, check out Maddie’s earlier video on Silks & Rope Wraps.

Next, Maddie shows you how to bring the silk across the top of the foot and under to create a secure lock. Finally, she’ll show you how to take the wrap off using your foot.

Practice your footlocks loads of times, on both feet. When we come back your memory will be refreshed and ready to go!

You can see all our videos and activities here.

Difficulty: Medium

Safety Warning: Don’t put any weight or strength into this – the setup is designed to remember your wraps, not to test the move properly!

Maddie shows you how to practice your silks & rope catchers wraps on the ground, for all silks and rope aerialists who can’t practice right now.

Using an ingenious setup of scarves and drawers, Maddie creates a ‘silk’ along the ground. She then shows you how to get into a catchers wrap from straddle.

Talking you through each step, Maddie demonstrates silk/rope placement, leg moves and arm placement. Finally, she reminds you how to get out of the move!

If you practice these silks & rope catchers wraps at home, hopefully it will refresh your memory! Then, when we are back in class, you’ll be able to get straight back into it.

You can see all our videos and activities here.

Difficulty: Medium

Safety Warning: This video shows you how to safely practice aerial on the ground, but if you are lucky enough to have a silk or rope at home be careful practicing these climbs in the air!

Missing climbing things at home? Maddie is too! To keep you practicing at home, Maddie shows you how to practice your climbing basics on the ground.

Climbing is mostly used for ascending silks and rope. Perhaps you’re an expert climber, but you need to keep practising to remember it all? Or, perhaps you’ve never had time in class to really master those foot wraps – now’s your chance!

Using a long piece of fabric, Maddie shows you a French Climb wrap and a Russian Climb wrap. You just need to sit on a chair or sofa for this so it’s really easy to practice at home. Practice your climbing basics lots of times, on both feet, so that when we come back to class you can remember everything straight away!

You can see all our videos and activities here.