Feeling fed up... Why bother learning an instrument in ptimary school to drop it in year 7?

[stillenacht]

Exactly that. Feeling very impotent as a secondary music teacher, going through my registers "Yes Miss I can play the violin/trombone/viola/flute/clarinet. I played it at Primary school but gave up before my 11plus/at the end of year 5/4/3".

Every bloody year more and more kids tell me this. Why cant kids commit to learning for the long term?Argh!!!!

[ZZZenagain]

if you cannot get any Kind of orchestra together or even much in the way of ensembles and yet the dept finances itself largely through concerts, it is a difficult situation. Perhaps if you did mostly film music, you could include a lot of guitars and be a bit of an unorthodox orchestra. Not sure how that would work but I suppose if they were doing mostly chords and you had some drums, it might work, would depend what other instruments you had. Perhaps even some of the teachers could join in to swell the ranks.

[Ladymuck]

From another angle, how easy is it for children at your school to have lessons? Ds1 is a 12 year old who plays a large brass instrument. He also sings in a choir, plays in the rugby, hockey and cricket teams, and is in 3 other school clubs.

Most of his friends do sport, only one or two do music as well. Ds isn't the most organised of 12 year olds, but usually does fine in most things. However getting to grips with music lessons which rotate round the timetable, together with the need to get signed out of lessons in advance, and getting the work copied up and prep done has turned music into THE most stressful part of his secondary school experience. And that is before fitting in the music practice itself. I have tried to explain to the Head of Music that ds1 can only get into trouble for doing music (because he forgets to get his card signed/actually go to the lesson so gets detentions as well), which isn't the case for sport etc. With hindsight his start to secondary would have been a LOT smoother if he had stopped his instrument in Year 7.

Ds2 is in year 6, prepping for entrance exams whilst keeping up his brass instrument, singing lessons and percussion. It is hard trying to fit all of this into a week, though at present he doesn't get a detention if he fails to get himself signed out etc. But if he follows ds1 to senior school then I am not sure that I will necessarily want him taking lessons at school.

[musicalfamily]

Bonsoir my DD1 gets (roughly):

• 1 hour violin
• 45 minutes piano
• theory class (max 5 kids)
• composition (includes use of technology, etc)
• ensemble
• singing

Plus other things like concerts, project days, etc...

[musicalfamily]

PS before even auditioning her I checked out a number of other junior conservatoires and they were very similar both in price and what they offered!!

[bigTillyMint]

DS did this. He did cornet/trumpet till the end of Y6 (and got his grade 1!!!) and then dropped it when he moved to secondary, despite them having a fantastic music department.

He is not at all naturally musical. However, he is a natural sportsman, so he wanted to focus on that. He would have driven the music teacher mad

[Bonsoir]

Thank you musicalfamily. How many hours a week total (including practice) does your DD spend on music?

[musicalfamily]

Well on the day she goes to the conservatoire she is there all day, from 9:30 til 3:30, sometimes even 4pm.
She practises every day, some days a couple of hours, some days an hour, depending on homework, etc...she is 8.

[Bonsoir]

That's a lot of extra work! I suppose that £3,000 per year isn't really excessive given the major impact on her life.

[BlackMogul]

I think too many people are not that bothered about whether their child learns an instrument or not and plenty of people are not home from work in time to supervise practice. Therefore the impetus to learn fades. There has been very little mention here of singing. No instrument to buy! My DDs love singing and have gained huge amounts from being in choirs at school and now university. DD1 also did music theory to get extra UCAS points. She had piano and violin lessons too but it is the singing that continues to give her the most pleasure. I think persevering with something hard shows universities and employers that you have determination, have the discipline to attend practice and rehearsals and shows you can work with other people. This is another reason why privately educated children get to the best universities. Music is strong in many private schools where lots of children play and sing and it is absolutely not mocked! Just look at the 800 boys at Harrow on the tv the other night - every one of them singing !

[SoWhatSoWhatSoWhat]

If any parent here is looking for a way for their child to learn a musical instrument cheaply, they may be interested in what I've found out today.

Further upthread, a poster gave me the idea of having another bash at learning an instrument, following bad experiences at school in the 70s. I've contacted a school for Irish music (the Comhaltas) that's in my city. There are a number of branches around the country - you can find them on this map:

comhaltas.ie/locations/ (click the right arrow on the map to move over to the UK from Ireland!)

The local Comhaltas member I emailed told me: "We meet on Weds evening once a week. Adults/children are taught in small groups in the various corners of the club. There's then an adult's and a children's 'session' for all instrument learners to play together for an hour at the end."

"If you want individual lessons, as a rough guide, most adults pay £3 to £5 for a 30 minute lesson and I think the little ones pay a bit less. If you find that you want to have lessons we do encourage people to join the Comhaltas organization:-cost £8 per year for an adult and £4 for children or £14 for family membership." Comhaltas says it can offer much cheaper music lessons than normal Musicians Union rates (normally £25-£30 per hour) because they have the back-up of being an international organisation

Cost of instruments: the one I'm interested in, (the Uilleann pipes), is pretty expensive - £400 for a set of practice pipes! So I'm going to start with the tin whistle - similar to a recorder, not too difficult to learn to play some jolly tunes on, and can be played in groups with other people/instruments. And tin whistles are as cheap as chips (like, £5.99). So that's me sorted!

Comhaltas also teaches fiddle, concertina, button accordion, harp, banjo and bodhran (Irish hand drum), and can put you in touch with teachers of other instruments.

So it's not classical/orchestral, but it's a cheaper way for the cash-strapped who just want to enjoy making music.

[stillenacht]

Singing, guitars and piano are all great I run three choirs at school but its the lack of instrumental players (strings, ww, brass) I am gutted about. Have been to primary consortia concerts where there are 50-60 flautists, where do they go between year 6 and 7. Our school has an excellent musical tradition and reputation I have just noticed a massive dip in numbers in those instruments in the last 5 years and those coming through are no longer grade 5 (for the best players) in year 7 but grades 2-3.

I have been teaching over 18 years in non selective, grammar, prep and comp and this is the worst I've known it in terms of numbers (steadily over last 5 years). Makes me obviously.

Just wondering if any other classroom secondary music teachers have noticed this.

With regards to art and PE mentioned earlier. I was crap at Art and never did any and got kicked out of PE clubs for messing around (I went and hid in the music room!)

[BlackMogul]

Music is very time consuming and there is a great conflict between music and sport, especially on Saturday mornings when children are invited to do orchestra at the music centre where we live. Only the committed do this as it means parents are tied to the routine of music school. Really brings on their confidence though. I think no-one at DDs primary schools was grade 5 in year 6 and this would represent the very musical kids only. At DD2s prep school, several were at this level. If parents are going to complain about the noise an instrument makes in the early stages of learning or does not make sure any practice is done, then is it surprising that children do not get very far and give up. I think your local music service needs to get children learning the instruments in schools into the music centre orchestras, assuming you have them. This accelerates learning and is a good springboard for secondary school, regardless of grade. But, as I said earlier, it it commitment, not computer games, TV or thinking getting good at something happens because you want it.

[Jux]

It drives me nuts that sport is now deemed to be so much more important than music. All through primary, music hardly happened but sport - extra sport stuff happening every lunchtime and every evening. One truly crap choir which sang nursery songs. OK, the HT was particularly against music, but still.

Our nearest secondary is not much better.

It is desperate in this country. Music has multiple effects on the developing brain and all of them good.

[lljkk]

how easy is it for children at your school to have lessons?

Well, found out y7 DD's mates got their letters & appt. times thru a week ago, but DD has had nothing. Email to head of music dept. but no joy from that either, yet. Argh.

it will cost £120-ish/term with hire, whenever it happens.

[stillenacht]

My DH (Head of Dept) has a meeting which is well advertised (in assemblies, parents updates and we get all yr 7 to write it in their contact books) in first week of term, like a lesson fair where the children pick up forms. The forms all have addresses to send cheques to (for the individual teachers) but still we have had 8 pupils this week hand us the cheques. Four pupils told me they lost their letter and six forgot to come to the meeting.

The HoD is prob running lunchtime clubs and teaching all day and trying to organise his/her peris. Its chaotic this term!

[stillenacht]

Jux I could not agree more!

[stillenacht]

Jux... What kind of an idiot head teacher would be actively against music???! Grrrr!! What an idiot.

[Jux]

She was and is, stillenacht. But the word is that she's a great buddy with the Chair of Governors and apparently this has some effect. We took dd out of school after a big fuss was made about one of the teachers being ex-stage and screen and very into music, only for him to be told once he'd started that he couldn't do any music due to the noise (just ordinary music lesson noise, not great amplifier twangy guitar etc noise). He gave up and concentrated on sport then. We sent dd elsewhere, where music was better handled but still not fantastic - there was nowhere else round here though

Most of her experience is with the Church. It is hard to find good teachers for her, here too. I'd move for that reason alone, but dh wouldn't.

[Picturesinthefirelight]

Dd has just started year 7 and has been playing piano for 3 years

Reluctantly after just two weeks it looks like she is going to have to give it up

She goes to a specialist performing arts school and dances every night from 4-6 plus Saturday mornings. By the time she gets home, eats, & does her homework it's past bedtime. There is literally no time for practice.

We're sad about it but she can't do everything.

[BlackMogul]

Just wondering , Pictures, why a performing arts school would not ensure she has time to continue with Piano? This is a performing art too! Jux, I totally agree with you. Sport was everything at DD1s school, but the new Head of music was so encouraging. He also said something to us which may be worth sharing here (although no doubt some will dispute it!). He said the universities like musical students and playing an instrument and/ or singing to a high grade, orchestra and choir participation and musical theory exams count more than being in the 3rd team for hockey! Silent - I think you need better contact with your feeder schools and get the musical parents on board, early! Could you not run taster days at your school for the children learning instruments so they were encouraged to continue? Can you run a music festival for your feeder schools? Relying on forms coming back is a bit unreliable. Music in primary schools always seems to fall on a single teacher and if the school does not have one then it does not flourish. Sport brings much more instant success than music.

[Picturesinthefirelight]

The school has an excellent music department & runs a music strand. Dd however is on the dance Strand She gets a music lesson, choir & vocal technique each week but as she is dancing until 6pm each night plus saturdays. something has to give.

[FastLoris]

There seems to be a couple of different issues tied up in this.

Are fewer kids learning instruments, or is it just that more of those who are are learning guitar, keyboards and drums rather than orchestral instruments? I don't know.

If it's the latter, I'm not sure we can definitely say that's such a bad thing. Times change. Far more people are going to spend their lives indulging an interest in rock, jazz, folk and related forms than in classical music, so it makes sense that they're learning the instruments that are relevant to them.

I think last I looked, classical music was responsible for 3% of recorded music sales in the UK. It's probably less now. As such it's always seemed weird to me that "learning music" seems to mean "learning classical music, in the classical way" to so many people. Huge government investment in free lessons managed to delay the inherent contradiction in that coming home to roost, but it was bound to happen one day.

Change is always unsettling. I'm a classically trained musician and a music teacher so I feel the pain of the OP. But objectively, I think what I see mostly is the education system reorienting itself around the reality of most peoples' lives.

[stillenacht]

Blackmogul I agree with the HoMusic who said all that.

Already take part in transition type concerts

[stillenacht]

The problem is FastLoris that I teach in a selective school and management expect a thriving school orchestra (we have 50 or so in it so not too bad, but they are overwhelmed with the older students). Every year we have a reshuffle when year 13/11 leave but every year less from lower years coming through sadly.

[curlew]

Pictures- but that means she doesn't have time for anything. That can't be right.