Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Piano lesson complaining - LONG

My DS8 has been taking piano for several years. He's never loved it, but he has done well. I can't really say how good he is as I am not a musician, but he's been to a couple of Suzuki piano camps and I get the sense that he excels. Regardless of his level of achievement it's very obvious even to a layperson that he is talented in this area.

He practices anywhere from 20 minutes to 40 minutes a day (so not a lot), and this has been the case for years. However, lately his complaining about piano has reached a fever pitch.

I took last week off from work and thought we would have the opportunity to get back on track without being rushed. I don't think it helped. Yesterday afternoon he refused to slow down, got frustrated, and I got frustrated, and the last 10 minutes of the lesson was done with him in tears.

I know I sound pretty heartless, but prior to this I was trying things like giving him pennies that chould be exchanged for leftover Starbursts and I also tried limiting his practice sessions to 15 minutes, with the idea of improving his attitude and gradually working up to longer sessions. Both of these approaches worked, but only very short term. He became overly focused on the candy and the time left in the lessons. Rather than improving his attitude and making him less resistant, he just wanted MORE pennies/Starbursts and time concessions.

In the last two years I have gone back to work and we have moved away from the Suzuki approach due to my time limitations. He prefers to work from a list, rather than having me sit there. I prefer this too, which is why we moved away from the Suzuki. But the problem with that is then he plays too fast. ALso, he needs SOME help or he will just say "I don't know how to do it" if he is asked to practice something that was just introduced to him.

He has experienced some other changes recently. He started at a school for highly gifted children this year. They definitely don't push, but he's probably working harder than he did at his Montessori school. He also goes to before school care, whereas we used to have a f/t sitter. His dad and I recently separated, but he seems to be taking it well.

Here are my current thoughts and I welcome any advice:

1. In general, I am leaning towards a "lay down the law" approach. I tried to make it easier / fun and I feel like he took advantage (obviously not consciously but it didn't work). It seems as though when I give an inch he wants to take a mile and 100% consistency of expectations is a better approach with him

2. I have already told him that he will now ALWAYS go first practicing (his brother plays too). I feel like the complaining is worse if he has downtime to get it into his head that he is going to do something else. He accepted this rather well.

3. One thing that has backfired is if I say, "You need to slow down to play this, or no movie tonight." He gets overly anxious that he will lose the movie and melts down. It took me a while to realize this as he is not normally over anxious. I think both the carrot and the stick have proven to work poorly with him, but what do I do when he simply refuses to play at an appropriate rate? Just unemotionally turn on the metronome? The problem with this is then we have: Play too fast. Play second time too fast. Play with metronome. SO now he's played the piece THREE TIMES before getting to the point where he can get anything out of it and we can start working on something. Then he complains that his lesson is "too long". Maybe I just need to tough this out for a few days until he realizes the cause and effect?

4. I think he is working on too many pieces. He's currently working on 3 and none of them are near polished. He doesn't have enough time for this, and it doesn't leave any time for practicing his prior pieces. I plan to speak to his teacher about his. I think they are all for upcoming competitions/concerts, but it would have been better to use the same piece, multiple times. Or maybe introduce a couple of real easy pieces over the course of the year that don't need to get to the polished stage, just to encourage his note-reading skills.

5. I made CDs and ipod playlists of all the peices he and his brother are workign on. DS8 reads music poorly and I think switching away form the Suzuki method has been frustrating for him. I have tried to find group theory instruction, but there's just nothing available of any decent quality. Over the summer I will hve them take an extra lesson to wok towards mitigating this deficit. But I don't want to push him at this stage.

6. I think his half hour weekly lesson with his teacher is inadequate. He's 8 and his lesson is back to back with his bother's. SO even if he attitude was ideal, he's getting < 25 minutes of instruction. I don't think this is anywhere near enough time. Frequently he doesn't play all the pieces he is working on. I don't think it's practical to change this right now, so that brings me back to #4 - he needs to be working on only 1 or 2 pieces.

We are having a tough year and all I want to acomplish between now and September is for him to make *some* progress and for his attitutde to improve. I am not pushing towards any goals, I just want him to have a serious extra-curricular. If he quits now, I think it will be all over. Also, if I let him quit his brother will want to quit too. Given that he is 8, gets minimal homwork, and does minimal chores I really can't see myself as "pushing". But my son seems genuinely distressed.

Why are you making him do this? Sounds to me like you are well beyond the point where he will EVER love this instrument. Continuing so his brother will continue does not seem like a good reason to me.

My gifted child is 15 now. One of the things I have learned over the years is that she has many talents. But if she hates an activity, talent does not really matter. She HAS tried many things over the years, and has only settled on her most serious interests in the past two years. Piano was among her activities in her early years, too. We have encouraged her to continue to do something musical, but she has settled on choir/voice instead of piano (although she still plays for fun sometimes, which she never did while taking lessons). So that is another option -- if you are very keen on music, allow him to maybe switch to some other instument or voice.

I am also not sure that kids (even profoundly gifted ones) need a "serious extra-curricular" activity at the age of 8. I try to expose my daughter to a variety of activities. As long as she finishes a season/year in something, I have allowed her to switch if she desires. The one exception is if we have to buy expensive equipment. Then I have asked her before the purchase to commit to two seasons or years to make the investment more worthwhile.

I disagree about the need for an serious extracurricular and it's something I feel strongly about. So there's that. I also think it's such a small imposition on his time. Even assuming it offers him NO benefit (which I disagree with) what's the big deal? We all have to do things we don't like. He's not unduly burdened with these tasks. True, he's only eight. But it's 3.5 hours a week. He is NOT in a pressure cooker environment. His music school is very casual, his teacher is very casual, nobody cares how well he does, I just want to see progress and a reasonable attitude. And given that the imposition on him (in terms of both time and effort) is so minimal, I can't help but think it must be due to something I have done and I'm wondering if I can "fix" it.

I should also mention that this attitude has appeared in other areas, albeit to a lesser degree. It's not a cause for concern, but I do feel like he tends to shirk responsibility a little. Not to a degree that's inappropraite for an 8 y.o., but the attitude isn't strictly limited to the piano. For example, if I ask hime to help me out with sock matching I always get a little push back. And he probably averages less than one chore a day, so it's not like my expectations are unreasonable.

In the long run, I am not averse to him quitting. But I have two reasons to not allow it at this time:

1. I have no way to replace the piano with another high quality extracurricular at this time. Maybe in September. I like the suggestion of allowing him to switch to another instrument.

2. I feel like his attitude has devolved into something unreasonable and I don't want to indulge it. I would like to see an improvement in his attitude towards task he percieves as unpleasant before I consider letting him quit piano.

I agree with intparent - when I read your post the first thing that came into my mind was what occured to me when I was a child - my parents were adament that I take piano NO MATTER WHAT along with playing tennis- for piano...this went on for 3 years - by the end of the 3rd year I loathed playing, my parents did everything from threaten to awards to get me to practice - I was pretty good but I hated it with a passion and the more I was forced to do it, the more I hated it. I finally flat out refused and they got tired of the constant arguing and thank god I was allowed to stop. For tennis, I was sent to tennis camp after tennis camp every single summer and was forced to play on a team - I was made to play for many, many years - I was very good and was ranked in the state by my early teenage years but I absolutely despised the sport. Finally when I went into highschool I WAS allowed to pick what I wanted to do - my loves were art and swimming. To this day, I absolutely despise tennis and piano with a passion and want nothing to do with either one - all the bad memories of being forced into doing something I never wanted to do come back when the subject is even brought up.

When our child was born, I told my husband that I refuse to force him into doing something he does not want to do as far as activities go...we decided that we would offer suggestions for activities and watch to see his interests - we also try to expose him to a wide variety of things and have allowed him to switch. It has worked out very well - he has found a large variety of new and interesting activities to try and do all without forcing him into something he does not want to do.

What is your goal in making him take piano lessons? Can it be accomplished on another instrument besides piano?

I enrolled both of my older children in piano lessons when they each turned 5. My daughter loved it and practiced on her own. It was a constant battle with my son. I finally decided to make him an offer - pick any instrument that required musicality and reading music (no just drums, although he could also play drums in addition to another instrument). He was thrilled and chose clarinet. He played in the school band through his Freshman year when the conductor forced him to choose between missing band practice and missing climbing practice. He quit band, but he still plays his clarinet on his own.

Perhaps your son hates the piano. I know I hated piano. I begged my mom to let me take violin lessons, but she made me take piano through my senior year in high school. I don't play at all now, because it is associated with so many angry, unhappy feelings.

As to your #4 and #6 - my sister and I had 45 minute lessons. She practiced 2 hours a day without being pressured to do so. I sat and complained at the piano until the egg timer went off for my required time of practicing. My mother was intricately involved with my practicing - telling me which pieces to do when, disagreeing with the approach of the teacher, and inputting her opinion in the way I played my songs. It made me hate piano not just for the piano but because it was not "mine" but was about my mom pushing herself on me in something I hated to begin with. From my own experience, I'd suggest finding ways to pull back and leave this between your son and his teacher so that it's about the music, not about the dynamic between you and him.

My advice is to "pick the hill you want to die on", because this has become a struggle of wills where someone is going to lose. Is it really worth winning to force an 8-year-old to play an instrument he doesn't like? If there is another way to reach your overall goal without making this a power struggle, I'd highly encourage you to get creative to solve it to get what you need out of it and still let your son feel like he has some say over his life.

What is a "high quality" extracurricular? My teen, for example, spent most of last summer collecting insects. It definitely took more than 3.5 hours per week, especially the identification part. We bought a couple of books, and found some websites. I did buy some materials (boxes, net, pins, mounting board, etc.), a total of around $200. I think she got a lot out of that activity (and when she took biology in school this fall, she found the identification process they worked on very easy after spending the summer working on bug ids!). It has helped feed her strong interest in biology, and this year she decided on her own to study for the USA Biology Olympiad test.

My advice is to be careful here. You can win the battle, but lose the war. While there is no question when the chips are down who is the parent in our house (eg, at chore time!), I also know that it is possible to damage your relationship with your child by forcing them to do things that are your interest, and not theirs.

FYI, I was an avid clarinet player in junior high and high school. I practiced for hours every day because I loved it. I gave lessons, too, and had students who loved it and some who hated it. I think it is very difficult to move a kid who hates an instrument to liking it. Even though I found great joy, and developed very high skills at an instrument, I have not forced my kids to try to do the same. They tried instrumental music, and it didn't "take" with either of them. I am fine with that -- as teens and young adults, they have found their passions and excel at them.

Belle and ABQMom,

I appreciate your insights.

My goal is to allow him to be challenged and to internalize the cause and effect relationship between effort and results so that when he does find his own passions he will be able to pursue them in a manner that will allow him to excel. As I mentioned, I am not a musician and have no dreams of him being one.

He's not forced to compete. He's not forced to be on a team. He only performs 1-3 times/year and exhibits no anxiety over it. I understand that you both have very negative memories of being forced to do something you don't like and I guess I have trouble understanding the why? of that. I mean, I can understand it in a situation where a child's life revolves around the parents goals of musical/athletic achievement. But that's not the case here. Again, we are talking 3.5 hours/week. Total. It seems to me that if someone really "hates" that, then it's not really about the task at hand. There's something else going on. I'd like to try and identify that and change it, if I can. And even if I can't change it and he does end up quitting piano in the near future, I'd like to avoid repeating the pattern in the future.

Regardless of the time commitment, I don't think he finds piano innately unpleasant. Both he and his brother were working on Solfeggietto and I stopped it with him because he just would not slow down to learn it properly and he needed to work on other pieces. In restrospect, this was probably a mistake. But he still likes to play the first two lines. He enjoys listening to Pachelbel's Canon in D and I asked him if he would like to learn it and he responded positively. He only complains about the piano when he is asked to play - he doesn't bring it up at other times. I am not ready to consider this a lost cause...yet. I would first like to give it one more go and identify where we went wrong.

Well...from what you've written, it sounds like you're pushing pretty hard.

I'm not sure why little children need to have a "serious extracurricular" forced on them. They're little children! They have their whole lives to be serious. If your child is completely self-motivated, great. If not, well...not great.

Also, and trying to say this gently, sometimes parents lose sight of the fact that their kids aren't their property. Your kids have a right to mold themselves into their own visions of who they want to be. From what you wrote, it sounds like you're satisfying your own ideas about what you want your son(s) to be.

Extracurriculars are supposed to be fun activities, of the child's choosing, that foster healthy development and help them learn to make their own decisions.* If you have to bribe or threaten your kid constantly to do them, you've turned what was meant to be something fun into another adult-imposed chore and/or more homework.

Giftedness is about an ability to learn, not about forced achievement at a young age.

Val

* I agree completely with posters who require their kids to stick with something for a certain period of time if the child's desire to do the activity requires the parental units to invest in expensive equipment.

Perhaps you've answered your question - this isn't his passion. Perhaps a better goal forward would be to help him find his passion and then teach him those very valuable lessons when they are applied to something he likes. Otherwise, that isn't the lesson he's going to learn. He's going to learn to NEVER agree to try something new, because if you hate it, you're stuck anyway. He will become less adventurous, less willing to explore new options for fear of the misery that will follow if he finds out he doesn't like it.

One of the best things I've learned in the course of parenting is that not every endeavor is worth finishing and not every battle is worth winning.

I understand your motivation, and it is vital for kids to learn commitment and discipline and perseverence - and all those wonderful character traits one gains from sticking through the rough patches to get to the intended goal.

I did refuse to let my son quit climbing one year and even made him go back and apologize to his coach after he'd quit and stormed out of the gym. Why? Because HE wanted to climb over everything else, but he'd hit a roadblock physically and wanted to quit rather than face the pressure of his coach and of his own fears. He made it past that roadblock and earned a berth at nationals that year and thanked me for not letting him quit.

Quitting something we don't enjoy, when we're talking about extracurricular pursuits or hobbies, is actually a good thing, because it doesn't waste our precious time on something that brings us little reward.

That is very different than quitting something we enjoy because the goal seems to difficult to reach.

Just some thoughts to consider as you decide how to move forward to a better place for you and your son. It's tough, and I feel for you.

That's very helpful, thank you. I'm still resistant to the idea of letting him quit, but this resonates with me. I'm not going to make any decisions on this until he's been back at school for a week.