Helping child practise an instrument when you don’t play?

[BurntSausage]

Sorry for the long title, I couldn’t think of anything catchier 😁

My DD has the chance to learn violin at school from September. Besides being unsure as to whether she’s too young (she’ll be in year 1), I don’t know if I’d be able to help her practise at home because I don’t play an instrument and I can’t read music.

How does everyone else who doesn’t play help their children?

I’m in a similar position (but different instrument and dd now in y2). I think dd’s progression is slower than if she had a musical parent at home because I don’t really correct her playing at all, just listen and support. But she is progressing and she likes that she can do something her parents can’t!

My dd2 plays violin and piano, and I play neither. I do read music though.
It helps if you can hear the teacher play the tune over so you know what to listen for. Dd2's violin teacher comes to the house and I used to sit in on the last 5 mins to hear the tunes, scales and the teacher would point out things she should work on. No need now (she's 15) but was good when she was still at primary (she started playing at age 6).

Year 1 is a lovely age to start violin. I do play but just to say, making sure practice happens will put your DD ahead of the game. From talking to music teacher friends at least. Do be involved, take an interest, get her to explain what she's supposed to be doing, look for videos online if you're not sure. I would learn to read music a little if I were you, it's not hard to grasp the basics, it will help you understand what she's doing and she will enjoy being better at it than you

There's an ongoing super supportive music parents thread on here which you'd be welcome to join in with any questions or just to chat. Some of the parents with the most musically advanced kids there started off in exactly your position.

Come and join the music thread on extracurricular activities, loads of string mums there, including those who don't play an instrument themselves. As long as you are interested and engaged, she will do just fine. You could learn to read music alongside her to help initially, loads of you tube videos. Maybe you could ask for a video of the teacher playing some of the tunes so you hear how they go and how to hold the violin. To start with it will probably be lots of open strings ( ie no fingers of the left hand to make different notes) so not too tricky to understand for a non- musician. Getting her into a good practice habit, eg 5-10 minutes every day will really help, lots of children fail to progress purely because they don't understand it's really not like swimming or gymnastics where you can manage without doing any extra practice from week to week. As soon as she gets the opportunity to join a beginner string group or orchestra, try to facilitate that as so much of the joy of music is playing with others. Take her to hear orchestras playing live or watch the proms on TV, there will even be youth orchestras in it. Oh, and encourage those first scratchy sounds, it takes time to sound like Nicola Benedetti! What a great opportunity, music opened up so many paths for me throughout school and beyond.

Ha ha, I took so long to type similar things!

Great minds horseymum

I was a child that played violin and piano (to grade 8 by the time I left school), and had two parents that couldn't even read music. Their contribution was paying for lessons and equipment, going to concerts and bugging me to practise! I have nothing to compare to I suppose, but it didn't stop me achieving.

Get her to 'teach' you - show you what she's learned and explain it to you. Be prepared for being told you're a bit rubbish - let them have that moment - and don't get irritated!

Ten minutes daily is better than nothing until you force them to do it the day before the lesson.

And reverse psychology works. If they are sent to tidy their room and start practising, let them. If they think they're getting away with not doing a crap job because they're playing an instrument, it doesn't become a horrid chore that they do anything to get out of. It's good practice for later years when they end up getting out of boring things at school to go and do something representing them because they're good at music :)

Leave off the grades and pressure - DP had one woman turn up with her bored looking kid, brandishing a degree level book for Berkeley saying she wanted him to be playing like that in a year. DP took one look at this 7 year old chewing at his fingers and kicking the music stands and said 'No'. I've seen really talented kids completely fall apart by age 14 because they've been put under constant pressure of exams and grades and 'when you go to music college' or 'you're learning this instrument now; because it's rarer so they have more chance of getting a scholarship or seat in an orchestra and, whilst it was OK at 8, 9 and 10, by 11, they were anxious about failure and at 14, they stopped playing at all. I've also seen those not in the slightest bit interested at 11/12 suddenly get interested at 15 and improve exponentially.

I've waved enough kids off to music college and defended some from the calls and emails of a cross overachiever parent to know that the traditional way is not always the best, let's put it that way.

DS played guitar from Reception through to Y2, we had to stop his lessons in Y2 as DH and I don't play anything and can't read music. When DS needed to practice for an exam poor DH had to do a crash course in guitar via YouTube - this was the last thing he wanted to do and we dropped it straight after that. It was too difficult for us as non musical.

I didn’t even know there was an extra curricular topic! Thanks everyone for your thoughts, I’ll definitely put her forward for it. It’s on a first come, first served basis so she might not get a place anyway.

DH just reminded me he’s slightly more musical than I am, so that might help too. Me, I can’t carry a tune in a bucket 😁

Um, we just pay for stuff, taxi her about and watch performances and DD plays - flute, bass guitar, ukulele and keyboards and has just passed music course at college that leads to a music degree...