To say no to buying a violin for my DC?

[NoInstrument]

DC is 9, Year 5.

School told us on Friday that we have to supply a violin for our DC to play in music. The school do not have any to lend out, it’s either we provide one or DC can’t take part in music lessons this year.

The cheapest one I can find that will arrive by tomorrow (lesson is on Tuesday) is £65.

I cannot afford £65. I’ve just spent £200 on uniform for DC as they’d completely wrecked everything else. And even if I did have £65 to burn on a violin we have nowhere to practise, I live in an upstairs flat and theres limits in our tenancy to what can be done when, instruments are not allowed after 5pm (DC is in ASC until 4.45pm everyday).

There is no second hand sale at school as the Year 5s last year played a different instrument.

I’m a single parent, DC is on FSM but school don’t use it for this sort of thing, they use it for the Year 6 residential and an individual subscription to 2 homework apps (everyone else has to pay I think £5 a year)

AIBU? And what will happen to DC if they’re the only one without a violin (which is likely as its happened before with trips, DC has been the only one not going on none compulsory trips when I couldn’t afford it)

Have you got a local music shop or school music service? Normally they can both rent out instruments for very reasonable prices. I've rented a violin and a cello from each on separate occasions - the music service in particular was very cheap!

Your DC would gain a lot from whole class tuition, even if she isn't able to practise at home (you could talk to the school about practising there). You could also approach the school if you can't find an affordable option to help support it. They might have some available (or the teacher may!) for a few..

Oh op, I would be the same, school lunches up by £1 a day near us, trios, contributions for various things, it’s all so expensive to send them to school. I would be the same as you.

I would look into what others have said about if it’s curriculum etc & I would email the head & say you’re really upset that DC would have to be excluded but you simply can’t afford this.

I suggest that you send a letter to the Head (and cc the Chair of GOvenors) along the following lines

I have read the letter dated xxxx from teacher xxxx about the national curriculum classes for music in year 5. This indicates that unless I provide my DC with a violin they will be excluded from the curriculum provision for music this year as it is to be whole class violin lessons. As you know, my DC is in receipt of FSM and therefore our family circumstances are not such that will enable us to purchase a violin for them. I am sure that this cannot be the case as it is illegal for the school to exclude a child from national curriculum classes due to not having the necessary equipment. Can you confirm that, given the school is in receipt of FSM premium for my child, you will be prividing them with a violin so that they can participate in the curriculum music lessons this year. A secondary issue is that violins come in different sizes and I understand that it is important that children have the correct size instrument for their hands/arms as having an incorrectly sized instrument can lead to issues such as tendonitis due to overstretching etc. CAn you therefore ask the teacher to check that DC is issued correct size of violin to avoid any such issues.

Another one seconding the complain! Completely unreasonable for you to make such a large purchase, and smacks of a very ill thought out scheme. I have heard of many whole class schemes; instruments are always provided and the class is split into small groups.

All county music services will have large stocks of violins for loaning to pupils. The school should have organised requesting some of these.

If things can’t be resolved, I would be amazed if the class progresses. The teacher will need to check sizing with 30 kids. Then tune 30 violins at the beginning of the lessons. That will essentially take up the lesson. I’m afraid to say only a poor teacher would take on such a crazy task so there is that to contend with also. When I started learning the violin at school (on a free violin) we were in a group of 5. I learnt very little until I had individual lessons. Ended up post grade 8 and a degree in music, so I did have aptitude, it’s just really hard in a group.

I know many professional classical violinists who teach. Their absolute max is 3 to a group. I have heard tell of groups of 10 in county services led by highly experienced teachers. 30 is simply insane. Larger than you would want of a group ensemble where they are having lessons elsewhere!

Request to speak to the pupil premium lead and ask for them to fund the cost of the violin. Due to receiving FSM, the school receives £1345 additional funding for your child. Although all the money does not need to be spent on them, the school needs to ensure they are using the funding appropriately, including preventing a child from missing out on an experience (such as learning the violin) due to costings. You are able to ask what your child's funding is going towards currently and to see if they can find the violin.

We donated around 10 violins to a loan out scheme there are loads around the UK. It's madness to buy new when you don't know if a child will take to the music

Hi op, I am a violin teacher and this is ridiculous! If it’s small group tuition, it will either be provided by a peripatetic from the local music service who should have a supply of instruments. I am a freelance peripatetic and provide violins for small group tuition and whole class strings projects (I own the violins and lend them out).

I wish I could help you I currently have 90 half / quarter size instruments in the house and about ten 3/4 size (yr 5 average height child will need a 3/4 size).

Where are you based? You are welcome to borrow one of mine if you want.

If not get a second hand one off FB marketplace/ gumtree or local FB groups.

Reasonable starter violins are makes like Stentor, Stagg, Eastar or Antoni.

School cannot randomly demand that all children need a violin from home- that’s madness. If they don’t provide them, they can’t exclude children from music lessons with their peers. I would take this further with school. No you won’t be providing one and also your child is not to be excluded if it’s something their whole class is a part of.

Is this party of the First Access scheme, OP, do you know? If so, then school (or the county music service) should provide the instrument. If it's an additional, opt-in music class then that's the only scenario where it would possibly be okay, but it doesn't sound like it is if everyone is doing it.

I'd be fighting this one. I've been a teacher for 15 years and learnt several instruments myself at school and I have never heard of people being asked to provide the instrument themselves.

Arrange a meeting with the Head. If that doesn't resolve it in a satisfactory way, write to the Chair of Governors. Also, you could find out contact details for your local music service on the county council website and get in touch with them (perhaps the head of the service), explaining the situation and asking for a loan instrument. Someone there may be able to help.

Basically, if it's a school request then they need to provide the instruments. If they can't, they need to choose a different instrument, it's a simple as that!

This is disgraceful for a child on FSM. I would ask for financial help and see what they say.

This country is breaking my heart currently with the lack of education funding.

The amount of folk I've met who say they wish their parents encouraged them to learn an instrument when they were younger, or put them through lessons, gave them the opportunity to learn, is a shame, if I'm honest.

This is easy to say as an adult - but there’s a whole load of work from the parent beyond just buying the instrument and lessons. A very small percentage of people who say this actually realise (or would have been willing to do) the regular practice required to become proficient in an instrument (particularly something like violin, where you’re doing your own pitching without frets on the finger board).

We are in Scotland and instruments are given out on loan by the local authority. Fees are waived for lessons.

I feel sad that children are missing out, possibly children with lots of potential, on learning due to cost of instruments. Music is an important part of a child's education.

DS 16 is learning electric guitar and there's no way a year ago that I could have afforded to buy one. He has a loan of one from the local authority.

OP please please look into this option. You should not be getting yourself into debt.

i think it’s ridiculous, but you might be able to find one. I gave a violin to the charity shop recently because I couldn’t be bothered to list it anywhere. I’m sure you could get a second hand one and sometimes they are better quality.

As a violinist I assure you the whole thing is a waste of time and money. You cannot teach the violin in groups of 30 in 3 lessons a term. It’s totally clueless.

A £65 violin will be shit anyway and you’d never buy someone an instrument if they don’t specifically want to play, have weekly individual lessons, and commit to regular practice.

I fully support the school teaching music but they should start with an introduction to the different types of instruments (and potentially have 1 of each of students to try), and listening to different kinds of music. They could start students on cheap instruments owned by the school such as recorder etc.

And btw at 9 years you don’t use a full size violin, you’d need a half or three quarter size depending on your son’s size.

It'll be the school seeking to fulfill the NC requirements for all pupils to have the opportunity to learn an instrument, through the local music service. They've been doing this for at least ten years in large groups and it sent a large number of children towards wanting to eventually take music at GCSE who otherwise wouldn't have realised they had ability in the subject, because the parents couldn't afford private lessons (or had ever considered their children might be interested).

The music service should be able to give details of rentals.

What you're saying is exactly why they do it. To widen participation and opportunity, rather than keep it elite and not for the poor to consider.

This isn't widening participation and opportunity, though. This is, at best, the tick-box approach to widening participation and opportunity, and nothing like the experience the 'elite' children get. They haven't participated if they don't learn anything worth knowing, which is likely given the amount of time they will get and the number of students in the group. They haven't had their opportunity widened if they don't get given skills that will take them places, and this type of teaching on the violin is not going to set them up with decent skills.

It is possible to teach violin in large groups - Shelia Nelson did it very successfuly in Tower Hamlets in the 80s. But it cost absolutely shedloads of money and was defunded in the end as unsustainable. See the documentary 'Beginners, Please' i think it's called, on youtube. This is the system you need if you actually want to widen opportunity, as opposed to paying lip-service to it.

^ This. The option of recorders is there if you want to give everyone the chance to learn music. They were used because they are cheap and easily replaceable - I am wincing at the thought of all those unwanted violins being bashed about.

Another option if inclusivity is to be taken seriously is not to impoverish your entire nation of people by unhitching wages from the real cost of living and pushing the cost of that most basic of human rights, living space, beyond the realm of anyone without rich parents.

It’s a total joke. As someone from a poor background, free school meals and hand me downs, I can assure you that there is no way of pursuing musical or other artistic, or sporting careers for that matter, from poverty. The only realistic aim is to allow more to enjoy it by understanding it, and that is best achieved using cheap and easily replaceable recorders. No matter how much the sound is disliked by delicate and poncy middle class ears.

Your local council should have a music team that can lend out instruments. You don't even know what size they'll need so to ask for one before the first lesson is daft!

The school CANNOT insist you pay to provide equipment for a national curriculum lesson OR exclude the child from that lesson if the parents cannot or will not pay.

I suggest you immediately contact the local authority OR academy Trust (according to which us the overall body for the school) and make this point.

In primary schools around here the ukulele seems to be gradually replacing the recorder as the instrument of choice for whole-class teaching. It is very easy to pick up and the overall effect is genuinely pretty melodic!

I feel for you OP, very tough when your child is being othered due to your comparative means and lack of consideration by the school.

My council does the whole class tuition through their music service for some schools including violin. One class performed at a concert I was at after a term or so of lessons and I have to say though it was quite basic - I think they were just playing the 4 open strings. If you’d been doing private lessons or even small groups I’d have expected you’d progress further.

My Dc school participated in the scheme with other instruments. I thought it was quite a good scheme tbh in encouraging all children to think musical instruments could be for them. Everyone got a loan instrument though without charge.

Regardless of cost issues though I’d be thoroughly pissed off to be told on a Friday night my child needed a violin by the Tuesday. It’s not like you can pop down to asda to get one. I would put posts on local Facebook groups, there are likely plenty around outgrown or abandoned ones around you can get for free or very cheap. Unless she is particularly small I would expect she would want a 3/4 size. If that fails I would also speak to the pupil premium lead.

I’ve also never come across a lease that restricts playing of musical instruments from 5pm, that is bizarre. That’s hardly late at night.

live in an upstairs flat and theres limits in our tenancy to what can be done when, instruments are not allowed after 5pm

Yeah because a kid playing a vioin 5:30pm is the height of antisocial behaviour. 😅 Si ridiculous and not sure it would stand up legally. Regardless, I would just play and if anyone questions it I would just show the landlord my “Classical Violin” CD/DVD which I just love to listen to every day. Presumably in North Korea Britain you are still allowed to listen to music after 5pm - problem solved.

They get £1,455 additional funding a year for your child. £10 worth of homework apps is barely scratching that. It is not the case that you can dictate what the money is used for, however, it should be being used for this kind of thing and for any trips that you can’t afford. Ask what it has been spent on over the last few years.