Just out of interest, have any of you managed to teach an instrument/singing successfully to your own children? Having spectacularly failed myself, I'm just curious!

Some people manage it, but I suspect most don't. I tried to get our boys to play together at Christmas, but even that was very difficult. The eldest rushed through on his trumpet before his brother had time to touch a note on the piano and as for my sax... ? Perhaps it's easier with girls.

I think it's to do with the child - parent relationship being so different from the child - teacher one. I'm actually stricter than most of their teachers, but of course they see me as a walking cash machine, taxi driver, fight referee, story teller, judge and jury, homework helper etc. As soon as they come home, they leave the 'teacher' and enter sanctuary!

Steve

I'm learning piano as an adult as my father managed to not teach me as a child. He wouldn't let anyone else teach us piano (he would have disagreed with them a lot) but he never got around to teaching us as there was no set lesson time etc. We did learn other instruments... but even then, my Dad once disagreed with my sister's flute teacher over the interpretation of a piece by Lennox Berkeley as he'd studied composition under Lennox and had proof read his music for him, so believed he knew more how to interpret the music.

He did help us a lot with our music when heading towards an exam... I suppose with a deadline, you have to organise time.

I think it works if you have a set lesson time each week... and you are very disciplined.
Don't think I could teach my own kids.... we'd just argue though as they always know better than me...

I know it's not music, but I tried to teach my children German when they were very young, thinking that I could bring them up to be billingual. It just didn't work - they thought I was being wierd! Having said that, they are both good at languages now, so perhaps it had some effect!

I think you'll find that most teachers would say that it just doesn't work. It's extremely difficult to combine the two roles and can often lead to arguments and even resentment. I feel (and I do speak from experience, having 3 grown up children who are all musicians) that the best way is to encourade them when they're young, teach them the basics, and then pass them on to someone else. It worked for us!

I haven't any children but have had some family experiences.

Being on a tight budget my mother asked me to teach my brother the piano and it was a complete failure. She then asked me to teach her and that worked as far as it went which was up to Eleanor Frankin's "Easiest Book of Hymn Tunes."

My father had played when he was a boy and asked me to help him revise but as he insisted on playing nothing but the scale of C major until it was "perfect" that didn't get off the ground. On the other hand he taught us all to drive and that worked. But he was a London bus driver- which probably accounts for me being perpetually accused to this day of hogging the mliddle of the road.

A pianist mother of one of my pupils has carefully avoided trying to teach her son but they are now starting to play duets together - which is nice.

I sort of teach mine but they are both young 8 and 6. I say sort of because we don't have a set lesson time. We work through a book of their choice and I sit down with them for five minutes when they want to show me something. It does mean their sight reading is very good but they never really perfect longer pieces. I am sure if the oldest one had proper lessons with another teacher she would be taking grades by now, but I am in two minds about grades for young children anyhow, and it suits her to play lots of beginner pieces with little interference. I have given them the option of going to another teacher but I don't think they want anything that formal and anyway they see me teaching other children the piano, so me helping them seems a natural progression from that. I think having a proper half an hour lesson every week would be very unnatural! I see it a bit like helping them with their reading books and I try and give them a lot of freedom to play what they want without me watching them all the time. It is a compromise - they don't progress as quickly, but in some ways I think their overall music education is better. I know home education has been mentioned before on these forums, my children aren't home educated, but actually seeing my children learn music this way I can see how it could work for other things. They are starting to really pursue their own interests rather than it being directed from me.

Nope it's not....I'm not musical so have never tried to teach them Music. They find it hard to play/work together even for someone else. Sbhoa will confirm this. They danced together for years and only had a mild falling outs. Glad it's not just my two!

I have taught both my sons singing....the 14 year old took T/G G6 last term and the 11 year old took G4 this session.The younger one did have a set lesson until last September and that has made it harder for him...he has worked through all the grades with me...the oldest did 2 4 and 5...but never had regular lessons with me. He seems to cope with doing it when we can....the younger one doesn't. They both did G2 theory in March and got Dist... that was a challenge but we had a lot of laughs on a Sunday afternoon....we are working towards 4 now.
I was also their teacher in Year 2 and 3 respectively... and that was hard.
Now it does work but you have to play it by ear and not get too up tight...I have considered getting my eldest to learn with someone else now...as he is a baritone... to be honest when I started out I practised on them....I am lucky that they enjoy their music and we get on.....usually.

I taught my stepson the piano over many years at 8.00am before Dad took him to school. It was not easy at all and totally unlike teaching other people's children - although you could argue being step he wasn't mine either - but I am the only Mum he has ever known and the emotional attachment made it impossible to establish a proper teacher-pupil relationship. For that reason he would argue with me a lot and I would end up walking out of the room which was not the best thing to do I know! Eventually we stopped after Grade 6 -so I guess we did quite well overall.

He didn't play the piano for ages while he was doing his A levels. However, I am delighted he now has a piano teacher at university and it was a real joy to hear him play one of his own compositions for the piano at a concert recently.

I taught him theory up to Grade 3 as well and that worked out quite well. We both enjoyed those sessions.

I teach both my two and have done since they began at aged 6, although we'd always done lots of messing about on instruments before then.

We never have formal lessons, we just do it as we go along, me supervising practices, making suggestions, etc. I teach about a dozen paying pupils, and I'm aware that how I teach them is very different to how I teach my children.

Mostly it works well, they are receptive to my input and we do lots of playing together. Some days it ends in tears, but only occasionally. The benefits of them learning with me are far outweighed by the small blips, if nothing else, the savings we're making. Both of them learn another instrument with other teachers so have the opportunity to experience that, too.

The key things, I think, include:

Being receptive to their mood, there's no point in trying to discuss dynamics or articulation when you've just had an argument about the state of their bedroom.

Keep as relaxed as possible, don't let it get too fraught.

Don't nag at every practice, let them have some uninterrupted playing time.

My two are generally very easy-going, well behaved girls (don't know if that helps!) We haven't got to the teens yet, but one has just got a Grade 6 distinction with me, so I imagine something is going right!

I should have said in my earlier reply that I think theory is somehow different. When one of my sons needed to get Grade 5 theory as a teenager (having done no formal theory before) I did give him some theory lessons to prepare him for the exam - and he passed with distinction, so it must have worked!

What a heartening post, KBF!

So glad to know I'm not alone on this one! On the other hand, I have realised that I successfully taught my daughter to drive, so it's not all bad news!

Interesting I wrote a similar post about 4 years ago when I first started teaching my kids!

I gave up teaching violin to no.1 son when he was 10 and had passed gr5. It was getting too stressful!! He now learns with another teacher who's a friend of mine. This is so much more relaxed for everyone involved.

I'm still teaching piano to no.2 son who is now 10, he successfully passed gr6 with high honours last year and is sitting gr7 this friday. We don't have a set lesson time and practice is erratic too so I am planning on sending him to another teacher when this exam is finished!

I have taught both boys a crash course in grade 5 theory and both got distinctions.

No.3 child has never took off with me teaching music....

I have four children a boy and three girls. The boy decided when he was 8 that he wanted to be different from his family and not do music. Myself and ex husband are professional musicians as were three of sons grandparents, his aunt and three great grandparents! However- the three girls are a different matter.

They all play the violin and viola and piano and one sings. They all also play a woodwind instrument each. I don't play wind so employed a teacher for that. However, I taught them all the other things extremely succesfully. The eldest I taught up until she was at music college, the middle one had 4 grade eights by the time she was 15 and I taught three of them and the youngest had a major music scholarship to prep school at six taking her Grade 5 violin the day before her eighth birthday and her grade 8 at 12. The older two are now out in the profession in their twenties and youngest does a bit of semi professional playing. They are all in their early- mid twenties. I started teaching them at different ages as every child is different in their readiness to start. From my point of view it was enormously successful. I had to slot them onto my time table though as doing it when we felt like it didn't work! They all had me on the things I taught to diploma level.

I recently put my 5 year old grand daughter on my timetable for piano and violin lessons and she comes like any other pupil and that is also working well.

My father succesfully started me off on the violin and also the trumpet ( which I now don't teach) and that also worked well.

Reading the posts makes me realise we were quite unusual! I hadn't grasped that before

I didn't teach either of my two daughters to play an instrument - I didn't dare! The older one was reluctant to practise when I was around too because I'd put my head round the door and say "You forgot to play F# there" or something like that. Both went to other teachers for lessons. I did however teach theory to the younger one. She attended the secondary school I taught in so she came for a lesson in exactly the same way as all my other pupils did - at a scheduled time. That worked fine, she got a distinction at Grade 5.

Wow...congratulations!! Well done it's great to know teaching our own can be successfully achieved.