About music practice?

[longestlurkerever]

How pushy are you when it comes to music practice? DD is 7 and has violin lessons at school. She's supposed to practise at least four times a week but it's always a battle and I'm fed up with it. I'm happy enough just to continue paying for lessons and gently encourage her to practise and shrug if she doesn't, but I think her teacher is getting fed up and I get lots of PA notes in her book and texts. I try getting tough and making her practise with threats etc but tbh it's no fun for anyone and feels a bit ridiculous. At the moment she's reading a book and I found myself threatening that she wouldn't be allowed sparklers after tea unless she put her book down and practised, then stopped myself as realised I sounded ridiculous. What do you do if gentle encouragement doesn't work? Is cancelling the lessons the only answer? It feels a shame as they are affordable and she enjoys practising now and again.

It doesn't sound like she wants to do it. My DS10 has twice a week lessons, all day Saturday with a group and still plays every night. I wouldn't force it. Find a more relaxed teacher?

I was quite strict in their routine. They had homework and music practice was part of this routine. I think if they want to be any good at anything they need to put in practice - be that music, football, reading, spelling, gymnastics or ballet.
She might decide to put the effort in later but if she hasn’t been taught the value of regular practice she’s more likely just to think she’s not very good and give up. That wasn’t a message I wanted for mine but we’re all different.

If the dc don’t practice, I stop paying. They are 7 and 10. This threat is usually dniygh to send them scurrying. They sometimes need gentle reminders, but both asked for muduc lessons abd are happy enough to practice when reminded .

I agree - sounds like she’s not that into it. Maybe have a conversation with her about the expectations to practice, and if she doesn’t want to then the lessons will be cancelled?

Sounds like she has no interest in the violin or maybe even any musical instrument per se. If that's the case, it will only be an uphill struggle. Personally, I'd find something that she is actually interested in doing and then you won't have to force anything.

Yes her teacher's logic is that she will give up if she doesn't get better but the answer seems to be to give up now, which seems counter intuitive to me. It's all very well saying she has to practise but my DD is very difficult to externally motivate - she is being monitored for SEN - so it escalates to s battle quite quickly and I have to pick those.

If you say she does practice occasionally, how about massive praise when she does? Are you able to take an interest in what she’s playing? Say you really like to hear a certain piece etc.? I try to suggest 10 mins to mine 3x a week, but try to find the time to do it with them- much easier with 8yo than 6yo.

She does have a lot of interest in theory though. The violin was top of her letter to Santa and she cries if I talk about cancelling. It'd be an easy choice if she wasn't!

If she's meant to practice 4 times a week how about halving the actual time and then doing it 6 times week instead? So rather than 4 lots of (say) 10 mins try 6 lots of 5 mins? With mine (cello so rather more clunky) having it on a stand so she only had to pick it up rather than get it out of its case helped - you can get these for violins too.

Maybe lend her your phone with a timer on it so she can time practice for herself - mine loved doing that - stopping the timer when she took a break and starting it again when she started again.

We had a lot of motivation - eg sticker on chart for each practice done and double if she did it without being reminded - 10 stickers for a treat. I also had a rule of no TV when she got home until she had done homework and music practice (mine wasn't a reader though so no risk of her getting her nose in a book).

It is the case that they lose motivation to practice so keeping it short helps.

I would however query what the relationship with the teacher is like. IME teachers who make PA comments in children's notebooks are rarely inspirational. You might ask if she likes her teacher or would like a change. Also, has she had the same piece for ages? At 7 it is usually best if they have at least one piece that is well within their ability to learn quickly and move on even if they have a bigger project to work on.

She says she enjoys the lessons but doesn't like practising. So I've said she can't have one without the other but this has not been enough to stop her resisting every time.

A 7-year-old needs help practising, really. For me, the best time at that age was 10-15 minutes in the morning (almost every day), and I would make sure my kids went through a few things their teacher had told them to work on, and that they practiced in an effective way for a short time. You don't need to be a musician to help a child practise, but you do need to take an interest, be committed, and think it is fun.

If I were you, I would either have your daughter quit, or I would take a little time to figure out what she needs to do and then go over it with her almost every day. If after doing this for a couple of months, she still doesn't want to learn then I would get her to quit.

A child can't really tell if he or she wants to practise if it has never been a regular and a successful thing. Done well, practising gives a real sense of accomplishment, self-knowledge, and joy. Having violin lessons and not practising between them is frustrating and makes both teacher and student feel bad.

This is just my opinion, and I think a lot of people would disagree with me.

Could you talk to her about what she enjoys and what she daydreams about when thinking about the violin? So find out what motivates her in the short term and the long term and build on that? Could you build the theory she enjoys into practice somehow - eg a challenge to learn scales and arpeggii round the circle of 5ths for example, or ask "how many notes do you need in an arpeggio to know if it's major, or natural/harmonic/melodic minor? Go on, work it out on the violin now! What's the pattern of tones and semitones in each case? Can you tune that one a bit more precisely so the next interval to the open string/octave is in tune?" etc. Make the theory come alive. Then she has fun using the violin to do the bit she likes, and learns technique without noticing

She says she enjoys the lessons but doesn't like practising

Perhaps then it's worth cutting down her practice time to something less daunting: for example, you could ask her to practice for 10 minutes but every day rather than, say, 30 mins 4 times a week? My son's piano teacher always says that even 5 minutes a day every day is more beneficial than no practice at all and remember because your daughter is young, her memory should be good, which means that even 5 minutes a day could lead her to remembering quite a lot.

I'm ashamed to say I used blatant bribery when ds was that age - a pack of Match Attck cards for 5 x practice a week. I didn't have to do this for very long as he soon developed a routine and habit. Shorter bursts was helpful too and I agree, most 7 yo need some support becuase they don't yet know whow to practice effectively.

Ask her teacher what you can do to help. Bribery didn't do my ds any ahrm - he's got one Grade 8 under his belt and another next month!

Thanks. A conversation like that is probably the way to go. I do suggest bits to work on but she gets annoyed at me. Though actually it's getting her to pick the thing up in the first place that's the hard bit. There's always something else she wants to do first, or she lolls about staring into space. It's a lot like teaching her to read was, though she loves that now and I don't know if that's despite or because of our arguments about it. She likes the teacher, she says, but I'm not sure the feelings are mutual. Personally I'm ok just to leave it fairly relaxed on the basis she might actually practise more willingly, albeit less often, but I don't think the teacher is. I'm learning the piano myself and similarly don't find time to practise much but the teacher treats me as an adult and w paying customer and accepts it's up to me whether and how quickly I progress. Sometimes I'm in the zone and sometimes I'm not but overall I'm happy to be doing it, without having any grand designs on the future.

The problem is, the less she practices the harder she will find it so the less she will want to.

Try setting just 5 minutes a day as part of your morning routine. I always find that my students who practice in the morning are better as once they get home from school they are tired and have homework etc.

Also try setting one small target a week, I always try and get my kids to show me one thing they've managed to do rather than focus on what they haven't.

I'd also second the pp that said to try and find somewhere to leave the violin so its 'out' and ready. I am a piano teacher and my violin playing is awful, because I didn't practice, because I could never be bothered with the getting it out etc.

Dd is (a little) older now And getting more driven as she wants people to be impressed /pleased with her efforts. We have a fixed, non negotiable, time for music practice every day. Somedays we will do more than others but apart from exceptional reasons we don't miss a day. This helped it being accepted by dd.

Are there any string clubs/groups that she could join ? DD's motivation shot up when she was playing in groups.

You could always look for s better fit of teacher ? Dd has had several violin teachers and some were a better fit than others

Thanks. I am trying to do the mornings, but obviously there is a deadline then and often by the time she's finished procrastinating and complaining she's run out of time. I'm just bored of our mornings being a battle to be honest - getting her dressed is similar but I have less choice about pursuing that battle! It might all be part of the potential SEN, or she might be just being a pain, I don't know yet. The stand is a good idea. I'll invest in one of those.

We make it clear that if ds doesn't practise , we will stop paying for lesson.

Yes, well I have done the same. But you see most people have found this had been enough to get their DC to practise, whereas it's not for DD, though she gets very distressed at the idea of cancelling. It feels a shame to cancel, just to follow through on the threat, but there we are.

There’s no point carrying on if she won’t practise willingly - she won’t get better. It’s one thing to have a ‘malaise’ when you’ve been playing a while, but at such an early stage it hasn’t ‘captured’ her and she likes the idea of it more than the reality.

When I started learning the piano (at 8) you couldn’t keep me off it but around grade 3 I started to lose interest and, similar to your daughter, I didn’t want to practise. The thing was, when I was given an ultimatum, I understood what I was going to miss.

Your daughter doesn’t.

Also, I wouldn’t want to teach someone not interested in the instrument sufficiently to put the time in. I’m not surprised her teacher is frustrated.

We had this, in our case two things helped

1. Fixed practice times so DD knew when she had to do it and it was scheduled like any other activity
2. DH helping her a lot, I would say 3 out of 4 practice session, the 4th was playing for fun.

We also made it clear to the teacher that DD would play for fun, she only ever did one exam. She was ok with it to a point but in the end DH and her came to a good working relationship sorting out DD’s progress.

We now are have to pull the plug, DD is in Y7 and with homework and hr other hobbies there is simple absolute no time and the violin is not a priority like drama and dance are,

I wonder whether she has it in her mind that what she has to play must be perfect so is actually afraid to practise?

I’ve told my children that it should be obvious to their teacher that they’ve practised (apart from anything else, not practising is a bit rude) but if there is anything that they still can’t get quite right, that is okay - it’s what the lesson is for.