Thread: Do Monday Classes Work?

Ok - I currently teach on Tuesdays at a community center but I may have to make some changes due to a schedule conflict.

The community center said that Mondays are open.

My issue is - do people come to Monday classes?

I have always found Monday classes to have low turnout being it is the beginning of the week and all that. The plus side - though - is that many of my mommies would not have conflicts with other things like kid soccer game and scouts.

My question to the teachers out there...

Do Monday classes work well for you?

I don't teach but I always liked Monday classes because at the beginning of the week I was fresher than at the end. The Monday classes I went to were always full, both in bellydance and yoga.

good point - thank you...

i've tried mondays before & the issue i ran into were 3 day holiday weekends. my rec was closed then so no class.

i had to constantly adjust my rate & remind people of this skipped class. it got confusing for students who weren't sure if they were "getting their monies worth" or if class was CANCELLED which has a different connotation.

i prefer mid week time slots.

Mondays are hard/hectic. I would have skipped more of my classes if I weren't personally friends with my teachers...

Monday classes have always worked for me. I was always leery of Friday classes, but it turns out that they can work, too.

I've had Monday classes for years. Yes, I think there may be a *slightly* lower turnout, but not a big difference.

The bigger problem for me is the number of holidays that fall on Monday. It's frustrating to have to miss so many classes -- especially when I taught for the city, they were closed for every bank holiday.

good stuff - thank you.

My community center is closed on Memorial, Labor, and Columbus Day so three Mondays a year. I think I could manage that but I am just so worried that people will be lazy and not do it.

Right now - I fill my classes with a waiting list so moving to Monday may lose those few on the waiting list but still give me a full class.

All great thoughts - keep them coming ;-)

I too have had Monday classes for a few years. The turnout seems to be great and as You (Ravenadesigns) stated, the mommies love it because it does not conflict with their children's schedules. The only downside is that if there is a 3 day weekend or we have a weekend performance, the class is cancel'd until the following week. Other than that its fine. I try to practice at least 3 times a week anyway just to keep new moves fresh on my mind.

I've taken classes at a private studio and they were open on Monday holidays (except for Christmas and New Years). By Monday night of a long weekend, I was ready to rak. They weren't as full but they were not empty either. But I guess that's something you can keep for the future if an opportunity like that comes up for you.

My Monday classes have always been strong ones. I'm actually coming up on the first full year of doing Monday night classes instead of just adding them for the summer months.

What I did because of the number of Monday holidays the center I teach at is closed on, was to make each session 7 weeks instead of 8 and add an extra 15 minutes to the class so tecnically the students are getting the same amount of class time as the Tuesday and Wednesday night classes do in 8 weeks. Actually they are getting an extra 15 minutes in the 7 weeks over the 8 week gals. Some sessions the "skip week" is at the end of a session, other sessions the "skip week" is in the middle somewhere due to a holiday. I do notice the week back after a holiday numbers are low but thye typically pick back up the following week.

good good stuff. I am starting to feel better about possibly making the switch...still thinking about it though and weighing my options..

I teach on Mondays and it works well. it is the first day to get back to work and the swing of things

I find students seem tired on Mondays! I run more advanced classes then but not the beginner ones, they don't seem to work for some reason, maybe the tired thing?

Hey Ravena,
My classes in my town are on Monday nights and they work out just fine. It just takes a lot longer than my Tuesday am classes since we have so many holidays on Mondays, as was mentioned.
I think Monday night is great. Wednesday can be a church night, Friday a date night.

Fridays have never worked for me and I don't like trying too hard with them anyway as it's "date night" but Monday classes have always had wonderful enrollment.

Originally Posted by ravenadesigns

Ok - I currently teach on Tuesdays at a community center but I may have to make some changes due to a schedule conflict.

The community center said that Mondays are open.

My issue is - do people come to Monday classes?

I have always found Monday classes to have low turnout being it is the beginning of the week and all that. The plus side - though - is that many of my mommies would not have conflicts with other things like kid soccer game and scouts.

My question to the teachers out there...

Do Monday classes work well for you?

I teach Monday classes and they have been pretty well-attended.

Speaking as a student, I prefer Monday classes. Like some of the other posters said, it's the beginning of the week and I feel refreshed.

Edna

Mondays work for me just fine.

My classes are almost exclusively on Monday nights (at least through the academic year). I've had no difficulty with enrollment and attendance in general over the more-than-a-decade that I've been teaching on Mondays. (On the other hand, I invariably see some atropy in attendance numbers by the time I get to the end of a particular session, but that has nothing to do with day-of-the-week.)

I do shift my class to Wednesdays during the summer just in case I can get any time off for making a few "long" weekends so I don't have to worry about it interferring with my class or having to arrange for a sub.

I don't have any Monday classes currently, but folks seemed to register in Monday classes as readily as they did other classes during the week.

As many posters have written, it's the Monday holidays that get in the way, especially early in the year; Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and Presidents' Day can often fall during one session causing my 5 week sessions to require almost two months to complete. I have noticed a drop-off on attendance after a class missed for a holiday, especially if it's closer to the end of the session.

I took classes for a time on Mondays and I enjoyed them -- it was a great way to start the week!

Deborah

I've had great success with my Monday classes!

I haven't noticed much of a difference in enrollment over the years between my Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday night classes. They all wax and wane from time to time, but right now my Monday night class has a new session starting next week, and it's full with a waiting list.

My Thursday class has more people in it than the two Mondays at the same venue combined, but that could be content (Belly Workout may be more popular than regular Beginning and Int/Adv dance classes). I have either taken our taught classes on Mondays for 6 years straight, though, so I guess Mondays work for me. :)

I teach on Mondays. Students generally seem a tad less cheerful and enthusiastic compared to other days. I see slightly more dropouts, too.

I used to teach on Fridays, but I don't (and preferably won't) do that anymore. I didn't really have a problem with attendance, it was just a pain (personally) to either miss out on gigs, or to keep missing out on fun concerts or other events.

Thursday is the last teaching day of the week for me, and then I notice tiredness and less concentration, especially with my improvers. I feel I need to do MUCH more explaining before they get it. Floor patterns with turning to the back, complex combinations and stuff.

Classes that miss a week due to holidays just run a week longer than my other days, so that everybody gets the same number of classes.

Mondays are good days for me, I teach 2 classes on Mondays. There are only a few major holidays on Mondays that I don't teach on and I think it is fine because people do like a little break from class from time to time.

I have 3 of my 4 classes on Mondays and they have always worked well.

For my class with alot of college students, mondays aren't so far into the week that they have tons of homework and club activities. For the other classes Mondays have just always worked for them, probably for similar reasons (their kids aren't as busy= they aren't as busy, and also they've had the weekend to run errands and do housework or whatever)

There is the occasional 3 day weekend but I've found that unless it's a bigger holiday, people tend to be around on a Monday night. Friday nights would be worse I'd think, because that's when people are trying to leave to go places, but by Monday night people are usually back home if they left anywhere.

Originally Posted by Queenie

Thursday is the last teaching day of the week for me, and then I notice tiredness and less concentration, especially with my improvers. I feel I need to do MUCH more explaining before they get it. Floor patterns with turning to the back, complex combinations and stuff.

My other class is on Thursday night and I notice the same thing. People just seem more tired and ready for the week to be over etc... much more stressed about other things that are going on (school, work, weekend plans) so it's harder to concentrate and let stuff sink in.

But then again, when I was attending classes regularly (before I started teaching) I always welcomed my "hump day" bellydance class as kind of a midweek de-stressor. Still harder to concentrate, but it was very much appreciated. So I guess we could look at it that way...

When I taught Monday classes, I made the start time way earlier then my other classes during the week. My ladies would come straight from work - no going home only to peter out on coming to class.

My Monday classes were full last term, we'll see about this term - of course it's the summer sooooo, it's not the norm.