Would you let your little girl pole dance? Astonishingly, the new child fitness craze is being embraced by many parents

• Pole dancing classes for adults are increasing in popularity
• And more and more mothers are now taking their daughters along
• Those who do emphasize the health benefits of pole 'fitness', as they call it
  

By Antonia Hoyle for The Mail on Sunday

Published: 16:08 EST, 4 September 2013 | Updated: 16:08 EST, 4 September 2013

Alexis Biggs shimmies up the pole before contorting her tanned limbs into position.

With one leg bent in front of her, she points the other leg straight out to the side, her opposite arm raised triumphantly to form what is known, among industry connoisseurs, as the 'beach babe' position.

Then, hoisted in mid-air, she crosses her ankles and places her left hand coquettishly on a hot pant-clad hip to showcase a move called 'seated lady'.

Work out: Seven-year-old Alexis Biggs practises her moves on the pole

Her diamante earrings glisten underneath her honey-blonde hair. As her audience applauds, she lowers herself to the floor and gives a coy smile.

It is an arresting sight. But not for the reason you might think. For Alexis is a seven-year-old who has been brought to this pole dancing class by her mother.

And she is far from alone. Little girls around Britain are ditching more conventional hobbies like pony club and ballet to take part in this disquieting new trend. It has become so popular that there are moves within the industry for children-specific qualifications among pole dance teachers.

Research reveals there isn't a town in Britain that doesn't hold adult pole dancing classes. And, as its popularity has burgeoned, dozens of classes have sprung up specifically targeted at children.

Several hundred youngsters are estimated to attend classes in pole dancing - or pole fitness as it is labelled - across the country, and their numbers are steadily growing.

The mothers who are taking their children are from entirely respectable families. They claim to be cautious and loving parents, who see these classes as nothing more than a good way of keeping fit. But can they really be right?

Stripping away the bias: Jean Heaton, Alexis's mother, says, 'It's keeping her fit and healthy'

'When I hear about mums taking their daughters to classes like this, it angers and astonishes me,' says child psychologist Emma Kenny.

'To encourage young girls to use their bodies in a sexual manner is not, in my opinion, moral. Children are being pushed into adulthood long before they need to, and this is one of the most extreme examples yet.'

Since the Eighties, pole dancing has been synonymous with strip joints and lap-dance clubs. But a decade or so ago, it stopped being solely the preserve of red-light districts and moved into mainstream life. Sniggering hen parties took classes along with middle-aged women looking for a novel way to keep fit.

It is even being bandied about as a future Olympic sport, and last month The International Pole Sports Federation announced new regulations (no 'overly-erotic' dance moves in competitions) in the hope it will become more 'respected'.

Despite these efforts, it has yet to shake off its sexual connotations. So it's startling, to put it mildly, that pre-pubescent girls are now attending pole dancing classes.

'It's up to other people what their perception is, but to me it's not at all the way other people make out,' says Alexis's well-spoken mother, Jean Heaton.

'It's keeping her fit and healthy, isn't it? It's simply not like it is in strip clubs.'

We're talking at JLN Pole Fitness - the studio in Westhoughton, Lancashire.

A Playboy clock competes for space alongside Dirty Dancing and Fame posters. Blue disco lights line the walls. In addition to eight poles, there is a swathe of black silk hanging down to be wound around bodies and used as a prop.

Nearly everything else is pink - from the walls to the glitter pom-poms to Alexis's sparkly cropped  T-shirt. Jean, 31, a stay-at-home mother-of-three from Warrington, Cheshire, has been bringing her  little girl here for six months.

She had enrolled her daughter at modern dance classes at the studio, but Alexis spotted the pole and thought it much more fun. 'I like it because you can meet new friends and learn new things,' says Alexis. 'Mum might be getting me a pole for Christmas to put in the garden.'

One wonders what the neighbours on her quiet street will think if Jean does place a pole in the immaculately tended garden behind her three-bedroom detached home.

Regardless, Alexis loves her weekly class, which caters specifically for children aged as young as four.

'We have quite a few four-year-olds,' says JLN Fitness owner, Remi  Tomlinson. 'They can climb upside down just like the older girls.'

Jean, who separated from Alexis's father, Brendan, 33, several years ago, insists: 'I like her to keep fit, but don't pressure her into anything.'=

But wasn't she wary when her seven-year-old daughter demanded she start pole dancing? 'Not at all,' she says, adding somewhat surprisingly that she'd never associated it with erotica in the first place.

Like mother, like daughter: Nine-year-old Holly Adlen asked to take up pole dancing after seeing her mother Tabley, right, doing it

What makes Jean's decision to take her daughter pole dancing even more incongruous is that, like most mothers, she prides herself on protecting Alexis from dangerous influences. She won't let her watch the likes of pop star Rihanna on television and believes the loss of girls' innocence is a worrying concern for society.

'Children are growing up faster. I see teenage girls wearing tiny outfits who aren't going to pole dancing lessons,' she says.

She has a point. Shops stock high heels for five-year-olds, toy stores sell cosmetics, and beauty salon pamper parties espouse the delights of children's manicures and mud masks. Perhaps provocative dancing for  pre-pubescents is an inevitable part of this bigger picture.

Studio owner Remi, 21, who used to be an accounts manager at Halifax Building Society, insists there is no cause for concern.

'We don't teach girls how to take their clothes off,' she says. 'You can't compare being in a pole dancing club to coming to a pole fitness class. They are two distinct styles of pole dancing.'

But Remi admits her studio is also frequented by women who do pole dance in clubs for a living.

'They come here because they're not getting the fitness side from the clubs they dance in,' she says.

'But they wear suitable clothing and are not performing the same style of dance that they would elsewhere.'

So, these women are using the same  studio as the likes of nine-year-old Holly Adlen, who comes to a mixed-age class with her mother, Tabley. She is the youngest there, while the oldest is 64.

Tabley, 32, started pole dancing two years ago. 'It's not seedy,' she says. 'That's a male reaction.'

She seems a very conscientious mother. She lives in a three-bedroom townhouse and she has another daughter, Coby, 11, who has autism and cerebral palsy. In addition to being Coby's full-time carer, Tabley has started a degree in learning disability nursing and social work at Salford University.

Within eight weeks of Tabley taking up pole dancing, Holly asked to come too. 'She wanted to try it because Mummy was doing it,' says Tabley.

She admits Holly's father, who works for a recycling company, was unimpressed. 'He said he didn't want his daughter doing anything disgusting like that,' admits Tabley. 'But he came round to the idea after he saw Remi performing some routines.'

Six months later, Tabley bought a pole which stands beside the dining table in their house in Oldham, Greater Manchester. Holly and her school friends practise there together.

Classes cost £10 for adults and £6.50 for children. And I ask Holly what makes her enjoy pole dancing so much. 'It makes me feel more confident. I want it to make me more flexible to make me more popular,' she says.

Core strength: Tabley has lost two stone since starting pole dancing

At school, Holly takes street dance and netball lessons and innocently informs me that keeping fit is important 'because some people die from being overweight'. Does she worry about her weight?

'Sometimes. Mummy says I've got a roll,' she says, pinching her non-existent tummy.

Tabley - an impeccably groomed woman who has lost two stone since starting pole dancing - laughs. 'Pole fitness has made Holly's stomach stronger and I tell her she has biceps like knots in cotton,' she says.

She admits Holly can't wait to steal her high heels, but doesn't think she is copying her in any other way: 'I'd never force Holly into anything.'

But once young girls start pole dancing, they seem to become hooked. Ella Broom, 14, from Trowbridge, Wiltshire, has been doing it for four years after watching her mother take it up.

'It's not about girls trying to be women,' says her mother Sam, 33, a personal assistant who started pole dancing five years ago to lose baby weight after having Ella's younger sister Ruby. 'It's something for teenagers to do. It's better than hanging around in the park doing nothing.'

In June she started her own pole dancing class for youngsters aged 13 to 16. She has eight adolescent students paying £5 for a weekly class.

'Ella's school lets me put up posters,' says Sam. 'I wish pole dancing had been available for me as a teenager.'

Sam has met with resistance, however. 'One of my daughter's friends wouldn't be allowed to do it because her dad would go mad,' she explains. 'But why? It's just gymnastics on a pole. We're nothing to do with sexy strip clubs. It's not about sexual moves.

'I'm looking into doing a workshop for younger girls. There is a gap in the market. We have a pole in our front room and my five-year-old plays on it.'

Ella's favourite pole-dancing move is the Scorpio, in which she clings to the pole upside down with her legs spread out like scissors. She admits boys at her school interpret her hobby in a predictable way.

'They think pole dancing is like stripping,' she says. 'I have to explain that it's not. It's about fitness.'

It is a justification that is repeated, mantra-like, by everyone involved in children's pole dancing. I only wish I found it more convincing.

Exhibitionist: Holly is the youngest person in her class, while the oldest is 64

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