Abra-Kid-Abra hosts camps, classes, and workshops to teach kids the ins and out of performing magic and related entertainment like juggling, face painting, creating animal balloons, and clowning. Summer camp themes include Kids Comedy, Circus Skills, Puppet Theater, Magic, and Let Us Entertain You.

The staff even gets to clown around a bit: They are happy to perform shows for kid or adult parties, street fairs, or school students.

Abra-Kid-Abra hosts camps, classes, and workshops to teach kids the ins and out of performing magic and related entertainment like juggling, face painting, creating animal balloons, and clowning. Summer camp themes include Kids Comedy, Circus Skills, Puppet Theater, Magic, and Let Us Entertain You.

The staff even gets to clown around a bit: They are happy to perform shows for kid or adult parties, street fairs, or school students.

Specializing in dance classes, Arts in Motion keeps true to its philosophy that dance should be artistic, thoughtful, uniting, and fun. Students form an integral part of the program: As they progress, they are called on to mentor younger participants and choreograph performances, among other duties.

Ballet, jazz, and modern dance are offered for children as young as two and a-half; most classes are aimed at the six-to-ten age range, although many classes and workshops are available for pre-teens, teens, and adults. A variety of dance camps are held each summer, too.

Offering an impressive array of workshops, classes, special events, as well as a gallery, theater performances in the Broadway Main Stage Theatre, and educational outreach programs, Broadway Center of Arts serves as a full visual and performing arts center.

The center holds classes in art, dance, and theater, and hosts a youth summer camp and birthday parties.

Offering an impressive array of workshops, classes, special events, as well as a gallery, theater performances in the Broadway Main Stage Theatre, and educational outreach programs, Broadway Center of Arts serves as a full visual and performing arts center.

The center holds classes in art, dance, and theater, and hosts a youth summer camp and birthday parties.

Chesterfield Arts, a non-profit community arts agency, promotes visual, performing, and literary arts throughout the community. It offers summer arts camps, adult classes, and special arts workshops.

The center houses a gallery that showcases artwork by professional regional artists, as well as student artwork, and promotes the placement of public art throughout the Chesterfield area.

Circus Kaput comprises a husband-and-wife team; Ginger Routh is a face-painting specialist, and Joshua Routh is a nationally recognized circus performer. Circus Kaput can travel for shows within a 30-miles radius of St. Louis.

Ginger can paint cheek designs or full-face designs, and she comes to each event with a board of designs from which party-goers can choose. She averages about 12-20 faces per hour.

Josh is the star of Jadoo - A One Man Comedic Circus and received formal training at the Circus Center's Clown Conservatory in San Francisco. His shows combine elements of juggling, magic, teeterboard, partner acrobatics, and tumbling.

Aside from offering traveling party entertainment, Josh hosts special one- to three-hour workshops for kids and adults, including one called "Clowning by the Seat of Your Pants," which incorporates physical comedy and clowning, and "Hokus Pocus," which incorporates magic trick training.

COCA swept all three categories of our 2008 Parents' Picks quest to find the best artsy class for little kids, big kids, and teens in St. Louis!

An extensive multidisciplinary arts institution located in the historic U-City Loop district, COCA (Center of Creative Arts) offers classes, camps, workshops, and performances in the visual and performing arts for children, teens, and adults.

The COCA Family Theatre Series, held in the center's 400-seat theater, is a favorite of locals, especially because theater workshops are frequently offered before and after shows for the whole family. COCA also hosts summer camps for kids, as well as art, circus, dance, or theater birthday parties.

In addition, COCA is also home to the Millstone Gallery, which features contemporary art exhibitions by regional and nationally recognized artists.

Founded in 2002 by eight families interested in bringing live theater to the Collinsville and Edwardsville communities, Curtain's Up Theater Company performs family-friendly plays and theater classics. Children and adults alike perform in CUTC's shows, and volunteers manage all the behind-the-scenes details.

Instruction in ballet, tap, jazz, musical theater, drama, art, and music is the focus of DaySpring School of the Arts, a school that infuses Christian values and character training into its classes. Homeschooling families often take part in many of the school's offerings.

The school is home to "The Company," a dance troupe of the school's strongest and most committed dancers, as well as to a musical theater troupe and The Drama Company, all of which perform throughout the year at community events and schools.

The school's summer programming includes two-week musical theater workshops, week-long art camps, preschool art and dance camp, and Shakespeare at the Lake for older children. Private music lessons can be arranged year 'round.

Leftovers, Etc. acquires surplus and recycled resources - things like fabric, buttons, wood scraps, canisters, school supplies, and more - from businesses, industry, and the local community and uses the materials to foster creativity and to advance education in the arts. The center offers a wide range of artsy classes (even for adults!), as well as a popular summer camp program.

The center is open to the public, and folks can receive a discount on the items they purchase by bringing in some of their own donated household items. Leftovers also sells used books, has a gift shop and gallery, and rents out environmental, behavioral, and other videos.

The organization can arrange custom-designed, in-house field trips for every age of school groups, early childhood centers, Scouts, home-school programs, and church groups. Kids with special education needs are welcome here, too. It also hosts birthday parties, "trash-to-art" shows, and special events throughout the year.

LifeLight Youth Theatre is a theater arts group for children, especially designed for homeschooled students. The organization offers weekly classes, one-day workshops, and summer camp workshops. LifeLight stages one full-length production each year.

In addition to its professional touring ensemble and local productions, the Metro Theater Company offers summer camp programs for kids ages four to 11.

Ms. Bridget's Conservatoire of Dance (MBCD) offers dance classes, voice lessons, and fitness classes. The venue can also host birthday parties. Classes are taught by professional dancers, choreographers, and former Rams Cheerleaders in a nurturing, contemporary atmosphere.

Summer camps are popular here. The MBCD Summer Dance Intensive incorporates ballet, jazz, hip-hop, tap, and pom/cheer instruction.

The Nerinx Hall Heagney Theatre is a performing arts center with full artist labs and state-of-the-art music classrooms, a 386-seat theater, musician practice rooms, and an athletic field. The facility hosts Summer Theater Camps each year.

Housed as the children's wing of the Black Cat Theatre, Piwacket Theatre for Children captivates young audiences with cleverly adapted fairy tales filled with catchy songs, fun dances, colorful costumes, and magical props.

The troupe also offers Create-A-Play Workshops and Theatre Camps to provide children with the opportunity to explore the performing arts.

Playhouse Productions is non-for-profit theater production group and serves as a training ground for actors of all ages. The outdoor Whitecliff Summer Playhouse is the mainstay of Playhouse Productions, and the organization also helps staff the award-winning Crestwood-Kirkwood Youth Theatre Program.

Spotlight Productions is a community theater program sponsored by Rockwood School District's Community Education program. The theater company produces two stage productions each summer: a camp-style youth production and another for teens and adults (with a few youth roles).

Spotlight Productions also offers a technical theater camp for kids that teaches participants about the ins and outs of the different aspects of technical theater. More information can be found online.

St. Louis Irish Arts serves as the local branch of Dublin-based Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann ("A Gathering of Irish Musicians"). It was founded in 1972 with the purpose of preserving Irish cultural heritage.

Beginning at age five, children are accepted into the program and can learn Irish step dancing or how to play a range of Irish instruments, including the harp, fiddle, tin whistle, bodhran, and harmonica.

Workshops are offered throughout the year in a variety of instruments and dancing. A three-week program is also offered during the summer.

Stages St. Louis, a theater company, sponsors the Stages Performing Arts Academy, which offers courses year-round for students of all ages and experience levels in the musical theatre disciplines of dance, voice, and drama. Special one-week "camps" are typically offered during spring break, and summer brings several class and camp options, too. Class schedules are available online.

The academy also offers Access the Arts and the performing ensemble Troupe Broadway for area teens and young adults with physical, cognitive, or developmental delays.

STAGES Academy 90-minute birthday parties includes 45 minutes of age-appropriate music, dance, or acting activities led by a teaching artists. The academy can plan celebrations around particular themes, books, or children's interests. Scheduling is arranged on an as-available basis.

Budding thespians with an eye toward performing the plays of William Shakespeare need not look further than the Summer Shakespeare Camps, which offer beginning and advanced theatrical classes for young people, taught by professional staff of the renowned St. Louis Shakespeare Festival. One-week, two-week, and three-week camps are available.

All camps are held at Clayton High School. Before- and after-care is available. Visit the website for more details about the summer camp series.

Located inside the 1940's-era former American Car and Foundry complex, The Foundry Art Centre - at 37,000 square feet - is an expansive interdisciplinary arts center dedicated to the creation and presentation of contemporary visual and performing arts.

Four galleries, including the Baue Children's Gallery, join 21 studios (fronted by glass for public viewing of artists-at-work) and the Grand Hall stage.

The Centre offers a range of children's and adult classes, as well as summer art camps.

Billing itself at the nation's oldest and largest outdoor theater, The Muny opened in 1917 - construction took a mere 49 days (minus seven days lost to rain, as the story goes) - and included a massive stage, an orchestra pit to hold up to 200 musicians, and dressing rooms behind the stage for principal performers.

Decades later, the 11,000-seat theater is still a top draw for national talent, and nearly every theatrical play and event imaginable has been staged here.

Muny Kids Performing Troupes acts as a performance and training ground for talented youngsters. Children ages seven to 19 must audition to join; once accepted, they act as performing goodwill ambassadors to the folks living in the region.

The century-old Tower Grove Abbey has recently experienced a renaissance as a multi-use performance center for arts, education, and community programs. The venue features impressive architecture, a spacious main stage area, great acoustics, and lovely stained glass windows.

Tower Grove Abbey serves as the home to the Stray Dog Theatre company and its Arts-In-Mind education programs, including after-school, weekend, and summer arts camps. The abbey can be rented for special occasions such as parties or weddings.

The 7,000-square-foot Wildwood Dance and Arts Center hosts dance classes covering children's movement, ballet, pointe, tap, jazz, modern, and choreography, as well as courses in poms/cheer, tumbling and acrobatics, karate, drama, musical theater, voice, and art.