Expectations of children in church choirs

[IWFH]

AIBU to think that children in a robed church choir ought to learn how to sit quietly and they shouldn't need bloody activity sheets (which they then argue about) to be given to them in order to keep them quiet, particularly when a couple of them are of secondary school age.
Yes I am of course a miserable old git (can you tell? 🤣) but as an adult choir member it's really irritating that the children no longer seem to be told how to behave or even how to just quietly read the hymn book during the sermon.

Probably YANBU, but how old are they?

The younger ones are 8 or 9.

Minimum age should be increased to 12
8 is still very young

YANBU. I was in a junior church choir for years. We had to sit and behave.

Is this a parish church, a chorister programme, or something else? Do they actually want to be there?

I’ve worked with children in voluntary and professional roles for nearly 20 years and I can safety say that attention spans have dropped significantly over the past 5 years (except maybe when it has come to watching a screen!) so this doesn’t surprise me in the slightest!

12 is too old for boys - their voice will break in a year or so. . My DS was in a cathedral choir from 8 and they certainly were able to sit still through a lengthy sermon.

We had to sit quietly and look interested in the sermon or we got a sharp poke in the back from the older ladies, conveniently sitting on the pew behind. I guess that option is not on the table, now.

I scroll on my phone during the painfully long periods of time-wasting in our choir practices.
Director: Here… are your… starting notes.
A soprano: Are we observing the comma after Jesu?
Director: Oh. Er… good point… Let’s see… how does… it scan… gram…mat…i…cal…ly?

But more seriously, yes. Sitting still is an unfortunate but necessary part of performing in anything. Teach them to play silent games of I Spy in their heads.

Teachers have the excruciatingly boring task of invigilating exams. I heard a discussion that they play Pac-Man when walking between the desks, or one of them whispers to another “who do you think will become prime minister?” They then stand near that pupil. Adults have ways of dealing with boring things (although choristers shouldn’t whisper. Adults have been told off for that at my church.)

My DC's primary school choir used to do special collaborations with a local grown-up choir, performing in the cathedral or town hall a couple of times a year. They would have been Year 3 onwards (so 7/8 and above). They were expected to attend rehearsals and learn their parts, sit quietly and patiently, stand up on the signal, file out quietly when done. No activity sheets or other entertainments provided.

But DC are now nearly grown up, so this was almost 10 years ago. I think behaviour and people's expectations of behaviour (for all ages!) has got a lot poorer in the interim.

I would definitely expect an 8-year-old to be able to sit still and participate appropriately, even more so for an activity they no doubt wanted to do.

Are they regular churchgoers?

The ability to sit silently and still and just think and exist in one’s own head is a very useful skill in adult life. It does need building up gradually and a lot of practice though which unfortunately so many people short circuit with phones and activity sheets. I’d be mortified if my twelve year old needed activity sheets to sit quietly and behave in a church.

I was in the choir when I was young, probably 9 - 11. I sat quietly, it wouldn’t have occurred to any of the children to muck about, or need an activity sheet. I do however remember it being bone crushingly boring.

The kids in the OP are probably being made to go by their parents. I was and I hated every minute. Now a committed atheist. Could never sing in any case!

I think that you can expect it, but you need to explicitly train them up. Set expectations, explain about making up stories in their heads / reading the music and hearing it in their head / thinking up good things for a game of eye spy / doing a bit of mindfulness (which they often also do at school). You can’t just expect them to work out how to sit quietly for 20 minutes from never having done it.

Yabu

Matthew 19:14 “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”

The effect of being stricter about this: the more capable and compliant ones will behave better but enjoy it less and leave sooner. The ones who struggle more due to neurodiversity or other issues will simply stop coming.

It is much better for the church to welcome the bit of noise and scuffling that is natural in a child that hasn't been told off for being themselves than it is for the grumpy older members of the congregation to approve of them being made to be unnaturally still and silent. In my experience the grumpy older members of the congregation will always find something to moan about, so solving a thing that they moan about never actually reduces the net moaning.

That is fine for toddlers, but these are children who have expressed interest, who turn up for choir practice and could be asked to perform at weddings. Squabbling and activity sheets - no. We are not doing this generation any good by babying them like this.

grumpy older members of the congregation

Oh here we go.

Goodness knows where the thinkers, philosophers, poets of the future will come from if no-one is capable of existing even for a short time without some external distraction.

Sure, but they’d jumped through a lot of hoops to be there, and it would have been made very clear to them and their parents thst this was a serious commitment, effectively a job, with significant time commitment at Christmas, Easter etc. I think that’s different to an ordinary parish choir.

YANBU. I take my 8yo to church and she can sit through and behave perfectly. 8 isn’t too young to have this expectation. My 6yo would be fine too but I wouldn’t expect every 6yo to but at 8 yes.

Activity sheets? Bloody hell! YANBU at all OP, this is ridiculous.

The trouble is at a certain point of kids “being themselves” the whole service ceases to function. Many churches have other opportunities for less formal attendance.

Everyone understands an occasional crying baby or a wriggly toddler, everyone can be patient with neurodivergence but as parent to a neurodivergent child I’m fed up with ridiculous excuses being made for tweens and teens not being able to behave appropriately. They aren’t all neurodivergent and even those that are, lots can be still and quiet for an hour if their parents practice with them.

The problem is a culture in which everyone expects constant entertainment, instant gratification, never to actually think too hard about anything difficult and never to be “bored”.

Yes sorry I would expect 8 year olds to be able to sit and behave appropriately, I certainly did.

A problem here is the expectations of the adults that their children won’t be able to do this, resulting in handing out activity sheets, which then cause trouble. Obviously much better to remove these.

I’d also ask if the music is challenging enough - do they have sheet music and harmony parts to learn, or are they expected only to sing familiar tunes without music to read? That would have been incredibly dull to me at that age.

Also helpful to have the Bible in the pews so there’s something to read (personally I’d like the Book of Common Prayer too but obviously that’s a bit specific).

The addition of effectively an extra half day of formal learning a week in the way of choir is a great boost to academic progress.

I was usually ok sitting through boring church services as a child: it was like school assembly. But the ones I really couldn’t handle were the occasional late evening ones: the worst being the Easter Vigil (I was spared midnight mass), which ran from 8pm until after 10pm, long past my bedtime. And then the adults would stand around nattering over drinks afterwards; no knowing when that would end, while I would seethe about the adults’ double standards about bedtime. Yes, I was that child. And I still didn’t get any Easter eggs until after the Sunday tidying up!

And once my parents had the audacity to natter over coffee (yes, coffee, after 10pm) for so long that we were late back for a guest who was staying that evening. It could have been on Mumsnet. “AIBU about my host not being back in time for me? I had to wait outside in cold and rain!”

@scalt I once had to do the whole damn shebang at Easter. All pretty terrible but Maundy Thursday stood out as the worst. No amount of chocolate could make up for that. It's shit being a child made to go to church by adults. As you say, it doesn't even end when the service ends.