‘Dance Moms’ Coach Abby Lee Miller Defends Her Teaching Style: Sometimes ‘You Have To Get Out A Baseball Bat’

Dance teacher/studio owner Abby Lee Miller has been taking heat for her yell-until-they-get-it teaching style on Lifetime’s reality hit “Dance Moms,” but the seasoned coach takes the criticism in stride.

“They’re young kids — do you have to be so hard on them?” Kit Hoover asked Abby on Friday’s Access Hollywood Live.

“Well, not every child. Every kid learns differently,” Abby told Kit and guest co-host Holly Robinson Peete. “Some children you could say, ‘When you place that foot in passé, you need to open your hip socket…’ and they get it. They make the correction and you never have to go over it again.

“Other kids, you have to get out a baseball bat,” she added.

Abby, who is often seen raising her voice at her elementary school aged competitors and/or their mothers during rehearsals at her Pittsburgh, Penn., studio, defended her militant style.

“When your child comes home and says, ‘I’m finished — I don’t want to do this anymore,’ that’s fine,” she said. “But when your child comes home and says, ‘Abby said this and Abby said that, blah blah blah,’’ it’s your job as a parent to say, ‘You know what? Go back in there tomorrow and prove her wrong. Work on it.’”

Despite her somewhat villainous portrayal on the Lifetime series, Abby says the proof is in the pudding when it comes to her success rate.

“Does it bother you, the critiques that are coming out for this show where people are attacking you for your style?” Kit asked.

“I love children. I’ve raised hundreds of children. There are children who work on Broadway because of me,” Abby replied. “I have kids at Tokyo Disney, I have kids that have made a lot of money and own a lot of property and are doing really well because of me – even out here in LA.

“And I know, if it wasn’t for me, those kids would’ve never left Pittsburgh,” she added. “I can say that confidently.”

See Abby in all of her dance glory on “Dance Moms” – Tuesdays at 9 on Lifetime.

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