To play devils advocate our oldest 1st violin teacher did let us move too fast. She didn't develop sloppy techniques. With that said, I don't think teacher #2's goal has ever been to slow her down. But we do a great mix now in each lesson/practice. We do these random note reading books... image reading paragraphs of random words that don't make sentences. It stengthens her true sense of quarter notes, C#, extra.. And we pick up new and more challenging warm up scales, finger board practices, and she is much harder on our DD about technique. Which I love because when she say "good job" or "excellent" it means something specific to her - not her compared to a pile of kids her age.
We are still whizing along - but the expectation bar is set appropriately. I do second the comment about private lessons. Groups lessons did wonders for the qualtiy of practice because she was kindly placed in a group with kids who started several years before DD - and because those kids play traditional suzuki - it took a week to get all our "read" songs down to memory. But I don't know how your lessons go - but ours are just geared for her. Plus violin is not very forgiving.
I'm a believer in research it, get opinions, then trust your gut. There may be some nuggets of what the teacher is saying that make sense - nuggets. Maybe poorly communicated nuggets - which can help shape what you look for in a situation that can really inspire.
And for what it is worth to prior posts, I think the "perfect" view can be appropriate or inappropriate depending on the child and the family motivation behind music instructor. For dd5, it is a way to express her creative self. It is a passion to make a joyful noise. And we embrace that for her, for her as a middle child. For dd7, we let her follow her sister's path for different reasons. She needs to develop a work ethic. We want her to learn that to be perfect or excellent at something it can take work. You all know what I mean more than anyone! For now everything she wants to do or do good at - she just "does". Some point in her life she may have a dream or desire and it may not come so easy... she panics at making mistakes so she may just throw in the towel than work at "it". With a bar set very high in violin, mistakes will happen. We hope years from now she'll carry with her the experience of messing up in performance or practice and surviving, and making it right. Lot of words to say - perfectionism can go either way. We struggle with it - so rightly or wrongly we are attacking it head on and hoping to force the discomfort of imperfection in order to develop work ethics.
Yikes, anyone else realizing how long this post is - may simply be a reaction to my avoiding laundry?
