Can/ does your child play their instrument by ear? What is your attitude towards this?

My DD and DS both learn violin and piano respectively like this-known as the Suzuki method-am sure you can google this and maybe talk to a Suzuki teacher in your area (look up British Suzuki Institute)

Both doing very well and seems not such a pedantic method of learning-as well as being heavy on parental involvement so none of that practicing scales for hours on your own!!!

I'm a classical and jazz musician so equally at home playing from notation or by ear, and teach my own students to do both.

I sometimes find that parents are resistant to the idea of their kids playing by ear, as if it's somehow "cheating" and not learning the "proper" way to do music. I find this incredibly frustrating because my own experience tells me there's often much greater musical thought and awareness involved in playing in a band, being able to pick up tunes or chord progressions by ear and vary them according to what you hear around you, than in sitting in front of a music stand slavishly sticking your fingers where the music tells you to stick them.

And then there's the fact that the really great classical musicians tend to have great ears as well as technical and reading skills anyway.

I teach children at to play by ear using Kodaly principles - learning to recognise little scale fragments from known songs, and gradually piecing these together. Like any skill, there are of course people who pick it up quicker in the early stages than others. But it can certainly be taught.

DD has been taught to play recorder and clarinet, she also can play tunes on them both by ear. No one has taught her how to do this she just can hear a tune and then pick up either instrument and play.
I am not really musical, but ExFIL who was a professional musician tells me it is a natural musicality and linked to the fact that she has perfect pitch.
So what I am trying to say is from what I have seen it is a natural skill and not a taught one.