About Us

Small Fry Dance Club was created to give young children a positive first experience with dance.

We recognized that toddlers and preschoolers learn differently—and deserve classes designed specifically for their developmental stage.

Our curriculum focuses on building confidence, coordination, listening skills, and independence—helping children thrive both inside and outside the studio.

Small Fry Dance Club – Dance Starts Here

Small Fry Dance Club was founded in 2007 by husband and wife team, Jana & Carlos Chapeton. The program started solely as an on-site extra curricular program in a small number of Bay Area preschools. After a few years the program grew in size and we started to see demand for public classes.

In 2010 we took a leap and rented a dance space on the weekends. The weekend classes took off in popularity and we soon had wait lists. In 2011 we made a bigger leap and opened our own dance studio in Foster City, Ca. It was a great location that was perfectly suited for our preschool age dance classes. It allowed us to grow the program and we were able to make better decisions on the direction we wanted it to move in. Unfortunately, with our lease expiring and the shopping center we were in closing, it was time to find a new home.

After an exhaustive search we finally moved to our current location in San Mateo, Ca. It’s a gorgeous 7000 square foot space with four dance studios. The additional space allowed us to expand beyond just preschool age dancers to all ages. The new location allowed to add the Principal Art program (www.principalarts.com) and combined both programs now span teaching kids as young as 18 month up to 18 years!

As of the writing of this page we have taught over 7000 dancers, at over 20 locations in the Bay Area. We would not have gotten to where we are today without our amazing families, dancers, and staff. It’s been amazing watching our dancers grow with us. Some started with us at the young age of 2 in Small Fry classes, and are now magnificent dancers in our Principal Arts program. If you are considering joining our dance family, we are happy to have you! Come grow with us.