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

The composing thing sounds kind of promising.

I think part of the problem is that he is at an awkward stage in terms of his musical ability. He plays by ear so well and it comes very easy to him. So he is easily frustrated with reading music. But if he won't read music, he can't learn on his own. So that's another reason I'm reluctant to just let it go. I feel like we just need to get over the hump. It's been a while now, though, and if I don't see an improvement (in attitude) soon he will have to give it up. But again, I'd like to try and see if there's anything I can do before taking this final step. My time limitations make it unlikely that we could get back into the swing of it if he quits now.

Maybe I should talk to his teacher about the possibility of letting him just work on super easy pieces for a while? So that he WILL backslide a little, but I should just accept that and not sweat it? And then maybe when he can read music more fluently he can go back to more challenging stuff? Maybe in September? I'm pretty sure the complaining would stop if he was working on easier pieces (although in general I don't think he is working above his ability).

As you can see, I am VERY reluctant to just walk away form this. If it's going to be a battle of wills, then I will have to. But I'd like to make SURE we are really at that stage and there are no other possibilities. Not that he has to love it. I have no problem with requiring things. But if he's going to be emotional about it, some thign has to change.

In addition to learning he's stuck and can never quit something he's not enjoying I see many other possible lessons he's learning. These include: My mom thinks I'm lazy, my mom thinks the way I want to play isn't good, if I don't do everything 100% I'm no good, learning anything that requires effort is painful, I'll never be able to focus in a way that is as good as what my mom expects, what I want is ignored, and my way of approaching things is wrong.

Over the long term it matters not even a little bit if he could play the piano when he was eight. What really matters is what he's learning about himself as a learner and a person. It seems to me right now he's getting a lot of negative messages about that can be baggage that can be difficult to overcome. I can say at this point in my life I barely remember anything I learned about piano or music in the six years of lessons, but I definitely remember the intense feeling that I was a disappointment and that my way of approaching this instrument didn't measure up to what my "talent" suggested it should.

As a result of my experience I took a totally different approach with music lessons for my family. My responsibility is to pay for lessons and provide transportation and to be an enthusiastic audience when you request. If you have problems and request help I will provide it. Your responsibility is to practice a reasonable amount (approximately five times a week) and to work with your teacher in a way that is respectful. If you take care of your responsibilities I pay for lessons. If you don't that's okay, take what you learned from it and move on to something else you will enjoy more. I can't say it would be the case for every child, but eight years later our student remains a devoted, self motivated music student. It is a passion. If it hadn't been and he moved on that would have been good too.

If you have to be involved in rewards or punishment to control his learning you've already lost the value of the activity.

JaneSmith,
You have already lots of good advice.

Fear these may sound harsh but they are to the point and I believe many now-adults remember their painful piano lesson days and wished some of these ideas for when they were children. (You probably do these things already so this is just a list.)

- let the teacher be the one to criticize and correct the child
- the parents/family - to cheer on any little success at all, yay, you did 20 minutes today, yay you finished that piece, yay I've never heard that piece played so fast but it sure sounds neat and different
- ask your gifted child, what do they think, how do they feel about their playing?
- what songs would you like to try?
- lets explore the different kind of music out there, which type do you like?
- for something completely different, lets look up what a blues scale sounds like
- there are some simple workbooks, 1-2 pages a week, for example, some comes with CD that work through music theory (very easy stuff for child to think they're are mastering it)

My child plays / practices with the piano, creates own music, and "plays" and learns for about 2-4 weeks, then we're on a sabbatical. The interest for us is not a serious passion but an interesting hobby. For those children who love it, they will practice on their own, but even then they may need a pause. Some parents have their children in lessons for 1 term, then off 1 term, on another term.

My gifted child is very sensitive to criticism but is able to handle it from gentle caring teachers quite well. Do you sense your child might be also? However, if I told my child played too fast or the beat is off, etc, it seems to immediately pierce the heart. Instead, I just ask, what does the child think of their playing? And when the child is honest with themselves (this takes time) and acknowledges their own imperfection, I think we are really making strides. Then I say, you are very insightful and understand yourself. Keep at it. I don't catch the child for not admitting it, because not everyone is ready every time to admit their own mistakes.

Just one last thought. Do you sense your own intensity in the matter? Do you think your children sense your intensity?

Best of luck.

Yes. It's my intensity, not so much my intensity with regards to this matter. But of course, I don't know exactly how he interprets it. The other day he was struggling with a tiny portion of a piece that was new to him. I broke it down into just two measures. Finally he did it right hand while I played left hand and when we did it he was all "Yay! NO MISTAKES!" SO he does enjoy his sucesses and perhaps they should be celebrated more. My style is to not dwell on successes or failures, but when something is wrong I DO point it out.

It's very possible that because I am pressed to for time and because previously I had to work with both children every day I pushed for efficiency. I say "efficiency" not performance becasue I don't think I've ever given either child a hard time for making mistakes or having touble getting something. But I've certainly been guilty of getting frustrated because something that should take 10 minutes takes 20. I'm talking about something taking a long time becasue they refuse to slow down or look at the music. I don't have any expectations for how long it should take them to learn something.

It honestly never occured to me that when he plays too fast and gets called on it it might hurt his feelings. It's obvious to me that he's doing it to rush through his practice, but I guess it's still possible that criticizing it could hurt his feelings.

I don't know if it's practical to let the teacher be the only one to correct and criticize just because he is so young. But I am certainly willing to give it a shot. I think I will still have to show him how to do certain things, but I can demonstrate only. If he does it one way, then jsut do it again and if we only get through one tiny portion of a piece then so be it.

Hi,

I played trumpet in high school. It was my choice of instrument and I was completely responsible for my own practice. I loved it and was evidently quite talented at it. I was encouraged to pursue it as a profession, but long term I knew my heart wasn't in it. I desperately miss participating in music though, more than a decade later, and plan to join a choir this year. Boy did I love it during the years I played. Music is such an amazing way to be able to communicate as a kid, when the words, thoughts and feelings you have won't all come together in the way you might hope! To give kids the chance to enjoy music is such a gift.

I have to say that I completely agree with passthepotatoes. I feel there so much scope for damaging your relationship with him in insisting on something like this for the sake of it. I feel extracurricular activities should be about exploring a passion, especially (and I don't know if this is the case for your ds or not) if that isn't found in the classroom. I get needing to learn to persist, but there are other ways to achieve this - and I think the lesson is more relevant to gaining an understanding that sometimes you have to do some boring bits to reach a goal that is ultimately meaningful to you (achieving grades to go on to a university course you want to do, practicing every day because you want to be accepted to a music academy, working in an entry level role in a field you love, persisting in the extracurricular activity you love, but is now a challenge, etc) rather than learning to persist in something that is of little personal worth.

Enjoying playing music is such a gift in its own right and I would encourage him to choose an instrument he is interested in and give him the space to love it - encourage practice but don't supervise it, offer assistance if he wants it, enjoy his performances, get him involved in a band or an orchestra. If he does find he loves it, he's likely to practice - you can't play well without it. If he doesn't, so be it. Find something else and take some pressure of the both of you.

Good luck.

Whose idea is it for him to perform?



This is where I can see the possibility some pushiness. You've defined the amount of time and you've decided that it isn't very long. Did anyone consult your son?


When I was a kid, I had to do something for only one hour every week. I hated it. Detested it. Dreaded it. One hour on a Sunday morning was enough to make me miserable about it. The Sunday before I moved out was the last time I ever did this activity.

Liking/hating something is up to the person who has to do it. No one can make a person like something by forcing it on him, and it's not really up to you to define how much is too much here.

It's very easy to define "pushy parents" as the ones who force a child to do something for hours every day. But this behavior is just the extreme end of the spectrum. If you're forcing your son to do an extracurricular activity that he doesn't want to do, you're being pushy about it.


A lot of what I've read seems to be about about you and what you want, not what your son wants. It's good that you realize you made a mistake, but the you-aspect of all this is coming out very strongly throughout this thread.



Maybe he isn't interested and doesn't think about it at other times.



There is no "we." There is just "he."



Sounds like he wants to give it up and you don't want him to. If he wants to play the piano, he'll do it without you --- passion comes from within. No one can put it there.

Val

I know this is not what the OP has in mind... but my D loves musicals, and I have started giving her piano books of musical and movie music (just gave her Aida for Christmas). She (who disliked piano lessons before she quit them) loves to play these. She has mastered some quite difficult Lord of the Rings and Phantom of the Opera music in the last year. She now goes and plays to take a break from studying. Absolutely no one is timing her practice, but there are days when she spends an hour on it (I sometimes have to ask her to go study her schoolwork, and suggest that she reward herself after 45 minutes of study with more piano time!). I enjoy listening, too

Ha. I just disappointed our son's piano teacher by telling him that our son won't back for a couple more weeks, which will be about four weeks total of no lessons and zero practicing. We have these breaks a few times each year and they really do WONDERS for our son's attitude... and, by extension, his playing ability.

Our son started piano lessons (largely at his own prompting) right after he turned five and for the first few days he loved every minute of it. And then he made the grand discovery that he doesn't enjoy practicing. We've had more than our share of knock-down, drag-out "arguments" over practicing, but somehow got through these and he improved.

With him, it really is just the practice. He enjoys playing for others, volunteers each year to play at a couple of variety shows and doesn't get too worked up about the more formal recitals. He loves to play side-by-side with his mom, who's much more adept than I am -- and that definitely makes his practice time survivable. There have also been times where his entire practice is spent working on improvisation. He'll get started and then 20-25 minutes later he'll come up for air, realizing that he got a little side-tracked. Some of these excursions have been more aurally pleasant than others, but they almost always end with a happy kid (& a tickled dad), especially when I tell him to turn off the light & close the lid, allowing him to totally blow off the structured portions of his practice.

He's four years into his pie-anna larnin' (sorry, we watched Yosemite Sam & Bugs Bunny on pie-anna last night) and still going strong. He still plays waaaay too quickly most of the time, and practice sessions often run twice as long as needed because he won't slow down, preferring to use brute force at whatever breakneck speed he chooses.

Piano has been an interesting lesson for both of us -- complete with patience, persistence, yelling, etc -- and while I recognize that it's hard/impossible to force a love of something onto children, I suppose I am providing mandatory exposure.

Music has been one of the only real challenges in this kid's life, so despite his chronic protestations, he's stuck with it for now. Allowing him to quit because he couldn't/wouldn't master a given piece just wasn't an avenue I wished to explore.

The biggest challenge for me was allowing him a more relaxed practice schedule than what the teacher expected. Mr. Teacher wants 30 minutes, five times per week, plus the weekly lesson, which normally lasts 45 minutes. Our son, however, typically only gets in three decent practices of 20-25 minutes -- but continues to progress so I leave well enough alone.

Don't forget about the extended breaks... we both come back quite refreshed. If your son is as good as you say, the breaks shouldn't hurt him a bit!

Dear Jane smith, I'm so sorry to hear about the possible divorce. That is truly a big let down, even if it's better. Here's just another opinion. Maybe not even a modern or a popular one. I hope I'm not twisting what I'm learning through the nurtured heart approach, but when circumstances change kids start probing every limit around looking for something stable. You see where I'm going with this. Get yourself togeather and decide how you're going to take leadership in your family. You've got a lot on your plate right now. It's not wrong for you to be in charge of your children. It could be wrong at times when you're out of line. How much experimenting are you going to give your kid's freedom to try when they are teenagers? How can you root yourself and establish a workable relationship right now that will see you through that? I know that statement will bring out people's views and what worked for them. You know how they have been raised so far. You're going to (possibly, sorry) be a single mother with teenage boys. You're going to want for them to trust your judgement. Not to add more weight to this piano decision, but that's what I'm seeing. Also you really want to comfort them, right now especially. So yeah, making it easy on them is not a bad idea. Then you can stick with it. Keep consistent. And not be in the role of a bully. Is it still a lesson if he plays by ear along with the cd for the entire time assigned?

Just read what Dandy said. Scheduled breaks is an awesome idea. My yoga teacher told me her students always come back better after taking a break.