basic skills

Skaters must acquire the ability to perform the basic edges, stroking, crossovers, and turns before attempting to acquire free skating skills. And rushing through this early learning will reduces the progress and success, since everything learned is built on these basic, fundamental skating skills.
Building the correct body posture and balance is essential:

Body should be upright
Chin up
Knees bent

Edges

Inline figure skating, like ice figure skating, is defined in terms of “edges” — two sides of a wheel (like two sides of a blade) with these “sides" are called edges.
Each skate’s line of wheels has two edges — the “inside edge”, and the “outside edge”. These are shown in the picture and drawing to the right.
On the skater’s foot, the side of the wheels next to the arch of your foot is the “inside edge” (the inside of the leg); and the other side of the wheels is the “outside edge” (the outside of the leg).

Forward Crossovers

The body should begin in an aligned position with the feet in a parallel position with the hips and shoulders squared. The right arm should extend forward at waist height. Your left arm will be extended be behind at the same height over the tracing. Relax and push your shoulders down. The shoulders should be directly over the hips.

Bend both knees and push off from the entire inside edge of your right blade without pushing from the toe. It is essential that the skater master the ability to achieve equal power from both feet. The stroking should be an even tempo/rhythm in both clockwise and counter clockwise directions. The skater should lean and look into the center of the circle.

Backward Crossovers (Crosspulls)

Bend your knees with the feet parallel. Your arms should be waist level with the lead shoulder being slightly lower. The right arm will lead and the left arm will be over the tracing. Use your left inside edge to perform the first push to start moving backwards on the right outside edge and gliding while the left foot crossover in of the right foot. The right foot extends backwards over the arc to achieve maximum power. It is important to bend your knees and lean into the circle with your upper body in alignment.

It is essential that the skater master the ability to achieve equal power from both feet. The stroking should be an even tempo/rhythm in both clockwise and counter clockwise directions. The skater should lean into the center of the circle and look in the direction of travel.

Basic Turns

Turns involve turning from forward to backwards and backwards to forward. They can be performed entirely on one foot or involving a change of foot.

Starting from a deep moving curve, the skater turns backward and holds their free leg off the ice. There should be continuous movement over the ice without any loss of speed or control, wobble or subcurves, while controlling the free leg as they glide back to the center. The object is to perform the turns with no loss of flow, good upper body control, and no change of edge. A skater’s edge control allows them to begin learning basic turns on two feet from forward to backward and backward to forward. As their skating improves they learn more advanced one foot turns (Three Turn) and change of foot turns (Mohawks).

The following video clips were performed on Snow White® or Entry Level® skates.
Some video clips file size are large, please be patient for internet connection.

Courtesy of Holiday on Inlines