Will there ever come a point when my son(s) will go and practice without me asking them too? And will there come a point when I won't need to sit in on most of DS2's practice to make sure he does it properly and doesn't sit there trying to find the fingering for random movie theme tunes?

DS1 is 12 but totally trustworthy and will do a proper practice but must be asked. I don't sit in on him for two reasons: a) I trust him and b) after listening to bass instruments for the past year the flute is now painful to listen to!

But there will come a point soon when my 10 year old becomes to old for me to sit with him when he practices... :pleaseletitbesoonemoticon:

If he's sitting there working out theme tunes by ear I wouldn't stop him. I'd let him do it for ten minutes or so, before putting my head round the door and suggesting that he now do his real practice. I never stop mine if they are messing around on their instruments. My eldest used to mess around with her pieces when she was quite small, changing the rhythm, or the key etc. My sixteen year old still needs to be reminded to practice sometimes, not because she doesn't want to (she'll do an hour's good practice once she starts) but sometimes she has her "I'll do it later " head on and she often goes to it on her own.

You have made me laugh andante as it reminds me of an incident that happened last week. I don't generally sit in on his piano practice but his larger instruments that could be damaged easily!

Anyhoo, I thought I better listen to a piece he had been learning on piano for the school music comp. He told me there were three versions, including the correct one. So I said let me hear version no.2. He had swapped the note values around which was rather interesting and showed some skill. But version no.3 - oh dear! Half way through Sandman he breaks into a couple of bars of"Oh when the saints" with trills(?) followed by four bars of jazzy chords and then back to Sandman.

In the end I was the one to do the growing up: I sat with them when they were little, guiding the process, keeping them on task, and doing my best to encourage them a bit - and gradually I came to the realisation that kids, whilst they have neither the maturity nor the judgement to see what is necessary for optimum achievement, do have a clear idea of what they don't want to do. Letting them see what happens if one doesn't bother can sometimes be more instructive than any amount of making them bother.

Both of mine stopped formal piano lessons some years ago: one, in mid teens, has taken up jazz instead of classical music, and is playing more than ever used to be the case when doing all that marvellously structured good-for-one's-education stuff. The other sings around the house and listens to a lot of music, and I enjoy the output from both of them far more than I did during the times I felt duty-bound to "keep them at it" - most importantly for me, both have found that they love music and are getting pleasure from making it. - oh, and it's their music. Not mine.

I’m all in favour of letting kids muck about and literally play with their musical instruments. You never know what will come out of it.

Teaching one family today, the older child is about to sit grade 5 theory. I started talking about a new topic and he cut me short - "I know how to do that. My grandparents have Sibelius on their computer and I’m allowed to play around on it when I go there." The younger child spent most of the time improvising on my other piano during the lesson. There is clearly a culture of musical experimentation in that family that serves them extremely well - they are some of my most promising students.

Let your kids mess about on their instruments as well as doing the organised serious stuff. It is all building their familiarity, confidence, aural skills etc etc. I so wish I had learned to play more by ear at that age! Doodling about without having to worry about "wrong" notes is really liberating.

I definitely let him "fiddle" during the holidays but as you know we have a very tight schedule during term time.

So, at what age should they definitely practice without any guidance?

I don?t think there is any definite age, it?s one of those individual things. I suspect it is more to do with the level of musical achievement/accomplishment - there comes a point where they can see what they need to do for themselves and don?t need the supervision any more. Again, different kids will get to that point at different times in their musical journey.

My best advice would be - don?t drive yourself mad trying to second guess what is going to happen. Kids do suddenly turn corners and it often happens when least expected. Nothing ever stays the same for ever, so even though it feels as though you are stuck in this pattern, something else will eventually evolve.

I think it comes down to personality type - theirs and yours.
My daughter (nearly 11) has been very self motivated from the first and at Grade 5ish standard on piano and violin is pretty much able to supervise herself. She likes me to be involved though and I think it's important that I make myself available for this as much as possible (I am very lucky that my kitchen leads out of the room in which all music practice is done so I can be appreciative audience and domestic goddess at the same time).
My niece (13) went through a phase when she would not play the piano if I was in earshot (even on the other end of a 'phone.) She is not a self motivated practiser and combines with this a reluctance to take advice from anyone. (She and I - my family assure me - are very alike ) Practice sessions with her mum regularly end in tears and tantrums (on both sides.) She is clearly quite gifted and enjoys practising (in her own way) once she gets started so we all tend to leave her to it - just insisting that she spends 30 minutes a day producing some kind of noise.
My son (nearly 7) is always keen to practice but never wants to practice for long. He usually does two short practice sessions a day - one supervised and one on his own. On his own he is very serious and methodical and covers a lot of material (but doesn't tend to stop for little things like mistakes) but once he has a captive audience he likes to get experimental - "I'm going to play you a scary version!" is the usual.
The reminding to practice thing is tied in with busy timetables, I think. Neither of my children needed reminding over the holidays (although I noticed practice sessions got progressively shorter as the weather got lovelier.) In school time - I have to be the one who says when practice gets done - because I know where we've all got to be one or two hours from now (theoretically.) Both children tended to assume they can get a lot more done in the time than they can - and never allow time for things like brushing hair, finding lost keys, or remembering that a 6 week project has just gone in the paper recycling.

Have I actually given you any advice? No - just waffle.
Basically - so long as you can cope supervising - supervise. It's like sleeping through the night or eating vegetables that haven't been pureed into a pizza topping - some children do it quicker than others but everyone must get there in the end.

I have one thing to say to you tonedeafmum.

No idea.
But I'm 35 and I suspect I'd practice more frequently/fruitfully if my mother was there telling me to when I got home from work

(Practice was never supervised or insisted upon when I was a child - much like homework, it was just left up to me to do what had to be done)

With all the tight schedules that we have these days, every day after school DS and I talk about what he needs to do that evening. He always wants 'computer time', so we agree what he has to do first, then what's left is his own time. He is definitely a 'faffer' and easily gets distracted so I have to keep reminding him what he should be doing.

When it is Viola time, he practises in his bedroom and DS2 jumps up and says that it is Playdoh time, so we go in DS2's bedroom. I can hear DS1 and shout comments to him (some of which are ignored or argued with!). DS1 is 9 and still doesn't quite have the hang of practising what he finds hard. So if he finds a bit difficult he would play the whole thing through, hence I do tend to drum it into him to just play the difficult section over and over until it's right then put it into the whole piece. We do have 'drama queen' moments (from both of us!), but generally it works well. He can now recognise when something is right/wrong, so that is easier for me. He likes to 'warm-up' (as he says) with a Jig, then 'serious pieces', scales, sight reading and then it's upto him whether he plays more jigs, other pieces, makes up his own, or tries to play things he's heard. We like him to do at least 30 minutes, but he sometimes plays upto an hour, there have been times when we've had to nag him to stop

I'm not sure when he'll be practising completely on his own - but that could be down to me! Being a perfectionist means that I can't let it go when he makes a mistake. Not good, so I do have to try to kerb my 'enthusiasm' for the perfect performance! Problem is - it seems that he's heading the same way too.

My son is motivated by playstation time. He knows he won't be allowed near it until the horn practice is done, so he takes himself off to do horn in the same way that he takes himself off to do homework.

As has already been said, I think it's a personality thing. I always had to nag the elder of our two boys, but the younger was much more conscientious and better at time management.

However, I also think that sometimes guidance can go on for too long, or become too stifling. (I'm not suggesting that is the case with you, MusicalNitWit!) One of my violin students of 9-10 years is quite capable of practising on her own, but mum gets involved too often, and said student ends up shouting at her. The result was that she arrived for her lesson last night saying that she was thinking about giving up violin because she didn't like shouting at her mum, but "needed" her for her expert advice. It took a while to persuade her that she didn't need her mum to always be there (she is one of my most talented students) and that she could (and does) get advice at her lesson. In fact mum is no expert; despite having played violin and piano herself in her younger days, there are big gaps in her knowledge, and so she tells child to do things differently because she thinks it's "right".

So children might practise very well on their own at, say 7 or 8 - or they might still need to be nagged at 16!

My 16 year old daughter does organise herself, but she boards! My 12 year old however does my head in! I have to tell her to practice and then tell her that means not just playing it through ..... and then..... "I haven't heard any scales".....
but I have to say, some of my best pupils are the same! It depresses me when pupils in yr 8 and 9 still need Mum to go through their scales with them- but unfortunately, with most of my pupils (up to age of 15 atm) if the parents don't do that, the scales never get played!

Depends on your relationship and personalities

I find myself acting as daughters PA more these days particularly at the moment when she is up to her eyes in GCSE work and music.

Emsoboe is capable fo going it alone but she always welcomes another pair of ears when practising.

Apart form maturity and independence I wonder how much difference there is when the teacher is very specific about how to practice and teaches practice techniques as part of the learning process?
And for those who still want or need to supervise to some extent how useful is this to parents when it comes to supporting your child?

At 10 epiphanya (pseudonym not acryonym) was not self-motivated enough to practice properly on her own. She would just play it through and think that was it, not really understanding the need for working on particular passages etc.. Her teacher said that at her age it would be much more effective if we practised together so I could watch her posture, bow hold, chin postion etc (it's a violin!).

But at some point, children need to take ownership of practice - an important step towards independence and thus parental sanity. That's happened now at 12 and working towards Grade 8. She has very clear expectations from her teacher about how she should practice, and also keeps a practice diary upon his insistence so he can see what she has done each week. She is practicing for 90 mins most days, not requiring, or wanting intervention from me!! Of course I can't keep out of it completely, and sometimes two heads are better than one so if she's struggling with something I'll go and help her, or accompany her for her pieces. Her teacher's input has been paramount in teaching her to practise independently.

I feel I've got great chunks of my life back....... Have to say I can't see my 8 year old son falling into this pattern for a long while though. I resort shamelessly to bribery - " I am going to leave you to practise these three tricky bars, and when i come back when the timer goes off, we'll see if it's biscuit-worthy, etc....". By the time he is 12 he may well be a very rotund cellist!

I rarely have to discuss technique (in terms of what advice have you been given by your teacher) on one of instruments and practice happens without any prompting. Infact the instrument that gets the most practice is the one where Emsoboe knows exactly what she needs to work on. Including where the lessons are going in the near and distant future. It's also the instrument that she can pick up different pieces and use all the things she has been taught. Her teacher is very straight, but also flexible, with her which works very well.

I have to say initially it took her a while to understand where her teacher was coming from but I've always recognised the particular teacher as being absoloutly top class.

One of her other instruments she also practises alot and is able to push forward without having anything like the same level of teacher support. Having said that what she works on isn't always what she needs for the lesson. Not that it really makes much difference in this particular case the teacher in question knows that she is doing other stuff on the side. Needless to say I find this teacher frustrating and inflexible.

I think it depends how much a child actually wants to learn a piece. Sadly, many of the pieces specified for lower grades are far from exiting for young musicians to play, so it is no great surprise to me that children need to be reminded to practice them.

I know that our own children will willingly work hard on pieces that they really want to play, (especially if they have chosen the pieces themselves), but it is a different story when it comes to scales and those grade pieces that they would rather forget about.

Oddly enough, our daughter (13) will not practice her cornet whilst we are in the house as she says she is too shy, but she is very conscientious about it when she does it. Our son, on the other hand, simply cannot walk past the piano without playing it at any time of day, but he will usually play something of his choice, or will practice his hymns for Sunday, rather than playing whatever he is working on at the time.

SB

I think that kids can will fall into two categories here. There are those that are driven to practice by themselves out of their sheer love to play music well. These need no encouragement to practice. Their innate love for music and their desire to play well almost forces them to practice. Then there are those that require encouragement (really the majority of kids). They will eventually mature enough to either know it's something they want to do and they are willing to make some time for it or they know that it's not something they want to do and will tell you they are quitting full stop. At some point the latter will make it clear they are stopping and nothing but nothing will make them continue lessons/practice. That's them grown up .

I think the hardest thing as a parent especially if you fall into the first category is to accept that some children do not want to play an instrument enough to put in the time to practise. That doesn't mean they don't love music. It simply means they don't feel they need to be able to play an instrument. In which case it's futile to force them.

You also have to work out whether they are really disinterested or merely have poor time management skills. This last year with scattered GCSE exams has been a bit of a nightmare and practice has been a bit irratic. sometimes it's just been easier to work on the things that are already done well.

I'm definately not in the forcing them mould though I'm not prepared to waste my money on lessons if they don't make some effort.

I think it helps to look at the wider picture here:

Firstly, learning to read music and to play a musical instrument has been shown to be beneficial to other studies; which is one of the reasons that public schools are so keen to encourage musical studies. (Likewise sport.)

Secondly; learning music, and especially playing in a band or an orchestra helps children to develop character, to socialise and to learn social skills.

Thirdly; music provides a safe and creative outlet for the talents, energy and frustrations of young people, and also helps them to avoid other less desirable distractions and temptations in their teenage years. Frankly I would be quite happy if our children didn't play another note when they reached adulthood as long as they got there safely.

I think we also need to remember that children's interests tend to be transient, and are subject to the inevitable strains of growing up, peer pressure and other interests; so a lack of interest in music is often temporary. Pushing children too hard to do something they may not want to do for a short while is usually counterproductive in my experience!

However, musical instruments are usually chosen for children for entirely practical reasons; such as cost, size, convenience; but that instrument does not necessarily enthuse the youngster in the ways that we might hope. As an example, our own son first played on a piano at church when he was about three years old. He was clearly fascinated by the instrument, climbed onto the stool, and kneeling he started to play handfulls of notes in typical three year old fashion! I showed him how to play simple chords, which obviously pleased him, and before long he was able to make musical sounds of his own.

Having seen this interest we gave him a Yamaha electronic keyboard for Christmas, which he loved, and then progressed to a piano. However, whilst he would spend hours improvising and playing tunes by ear (with remarkable accuracy), he just would not settle to lessons, and his sight reading remained poor. Then, at the age of 13 on a cold, wet Sunday afternoon he got to play on a real pipe organ for the first time. It would not be an exaggeration to say that this experience quite literally changed his life, as he immediately saw a reason to learn to play properly, and is now quite obsessive about playing the instrument. Unfortunately, Mrs Swellbox and our daughter do not share our obsession, so our problems tend to be the reverse of those discussed in this thread!

However, I think this story does perhaps demonstrate that it is sometimes a matter of finding the right instrument, rather than just plugging away at whatever happens to be available.

Ironically, our piano is used more now than ever; not to play piano music, but to practice hymns and organ music in comfort!

SB

This whole thread is really interesting. My daughter (aged 8) started violin this year and at the beginning of the year I was told by the teacher that it would be good if I could go to the lessons with her so that I could help with her practice at home. So, since September I have tried to go to as many lessons as possible (not easy with a 6 and 4 year olds to organise and husband away in Afghanistan (now returned by the way). Anyway, my daughter's practice sessions at home very soon turned into a total battle ground. Once we got beyond how to hold the bow (not being a violinist myself it felt like the blind leading the blind), then she would play all the notes at equal value, so crochets and minims all sound the same and only slightly different from quavers. Any attempt to get her to count or clap in time were not well received, to put it mildly.

We have pushed through until May. She has had one "recital" and really enjoyed playing with other children in front of an audience. I have tried to back off completely from the practice. I let her go and do the technical exercises on her own and then come an listen and help with the short pieces she is learning. THis seems to work but if practice goes badly she screams that she hates violin and wants to stop at the end of the year. The thing is that next year she can join the beginners' orchestra which I know she will love. Should I let her give up? Should I leave her to practise completely on her own even though she is out of time and a little out of tune?

Just to add an extra dimension, we live in France so she is learning do reh mi and not CDE and doesn't seem to count, just does a ta ta ta ta taaa taaa method. (Those living in France might understand all this).

Any tips?

Is she learning in the local conservatoire or (ecole de musique) and does she have separate solfege/formation musicale lessons? My experience of French music schools is that the children can't transfer what they learn in the solfege lessons to the instrument lessons and that having no understanding of how to count is extremely common (and also children who can name all the notes in a piece of music without a problem but be unable to play any of them on the instrument). I would be inclined not to insist too much on the counting for the time-being, particularly if you are not using the same system as her. With a bit of luck it will either "click" by itself or (as mine eventually did) she will ask you to help and will be more receptive to your "method" because she is intellectually ready to cope with two different systems.

As for helping with practice, I think it very much depends on the child's personality. My elder daughter (now 14) still likes me to be present and likes me to pick out bits for her to work on. My younger daughter (11) has days when she refuses to practise on the same floor of the house as me (let alone the same room!). These days I remind her to go and practise but don't offer any help unless she asks me too (and even then it is not always welcome).

THank you. She is at the local Conservatoire and does 2 hours of solfege/formation, which she quite likes and she goes to choir, which she also enjoys. The main thing she doesn't like is the practice with Mother.

In which case, I think you'll just have to resign yourself to hearing wrong notes and wrong rhythms. Easier said than done, I know.

What really annoys me with my daughter is when she has refused to listen to me all week and then comes back from a lesson saying in an accusing tone "Why didn't you tell me that I was doing X wrong?" Invariably X is something I had heard but not remarked on because it was towards the end of the piece and we had already fallen out over A, B and C at the beginning of the piece.

Even worse is that we are both learning the oboe with the same teacher (I tried to encourage her to take up the clarinet or flute instead but she insisted she wanted to learn the oboe). He used to suggest that I remind her about various things while she was practising but I ended up telling him that I couldn't cope with the conflicts that generated. I had to laugh one week though at the end of a holiday period, when she said to me a couple of days before her lesson, "I like my way of playing the rhythm better but I have noticed that S (our teacher) prefers yours. Can you help me play it your way?"

I'm still trying to get my head around the idea of how any teacher, regardless of the system, can teach an instrument without managing to teach note/rhythm reading. It must be awfully difficult to avoid it.....
I'm not getting the impression that the instrument teaching is by rote and intended not to use printed music.

This system is slighly more comprehensible when you know that it dates back to when children had to learn to read music before they started an instrument. They would have a whole year (sometimes two) of just reading note names and tapping rhythms and only then would be allowed to chose an instrument. This meant that only a small number of highly motivated children actually started an instrument as most gave up before they got their hands on an instrument. It may have worked in the past but the problem now is that they start instruments and solfege at the same time.

In today's music schools, depending on what sort of teacher you are, there are various options:
1) You lose your temper with the child, say that they "ought to know what that note is by now because they have seen it in their solfege classes" and you have a very high turnover rate (and complain that you have endless beginners and never any advanced pupils).
2) You leave the child to "work out" the notes at home and you don't complain if they come back to the next lesson with every single note name written over the top.
3) You sing the note names as the child is playing in the hope that the names will eventually sink in (and pieces progress very, very slowly).
4) If the child has a good ear you can play the piece to them and be under the illusion for a while that they can actually read the music.

Having said all that, I am really just as baffled by the system as you are.

On the other hand, right from the beginning my oboe teacher was impressed by my sight-reading skills and after a couple of months asked how English people were taught since it was obviously so effective. When I told him there were no special lessons and I just learnt as I learnt the instrument he couldn't see how you could possibly teach note/rhythm reading and instrumental technique during an instrumental lesson when you only have 30 minutes. It is obviously something that puzzles him as he has come back to the question several times over the years but since I started the recorder when I was 5 1/2 and the piano when I was 8 I really can't remember how my lessons at the time were structured.

You explain the French system very well. My daughter can look at a piece and read out all the notes - do mi mi do fa fa and so on. And in fact she can do the rhythm in ta - ie ta ta tatata ta. But she doesn't do the "one and two and three and four and", that I remember my father trying to knock into me. She is also really encouraged to sing and develop her ear which I do not remember doing as a child.

The French system also makes the whole family have to be involved when there are four lessons a week (solfege twice, choir and violin) just for one child so you and the child have to be super motivated, otherwise it is torture. Next year my other daughter is starting French horn so there will be even more commitment.

I wouldn't worry about the time names. On the whole I think it's a more reliably way of counting rhythm than one and two and.....

I found the early years very frustrating. I taught my elder daughter to sight-read cello music using a suzuki note-reading book (but this was after she had been learning for a couple of years). I am currently teaching her tenor clef because she has learnt (and can read fluently) the treble clef in her solfege class (which is of no use to her yet) but not the tenor clef which she needs for her pieces. You're right about the singing though. She has now got a nice singing voice and can sight-sing (something I have never known how to do).


Good luck The worst thing I found was sorting out timetables at the beginning of the year since everything changes every year and it seemed to be virtually impossible to arrange for classes to co-incide. Mine are both now at college in a CHAM class (classes a horaires amenagees musique) which means they get to go to the Conservatoire two afternoons a week and all the music lessons are done during school time (although they both do a second instrument outside school) and this has made my life a lot simpler.

Good! Hooray!!! I too had teachers try to 'knock into me' the one-and-two-and...but it was only when I learned rhythm names (and how they relate to the pulse) that I started to be able to both understand and read rhythms..







(see above).

I hardly EVER 'count' - only if I have a very long tied note or many bars of rests..

Don't let my father hear you say that!

I'll try not to...



(But my point being that 'counting' can actually be counter-productive, IMHO..)

Do they use the same kinds of tutor books in France? I'm just thinking that I seem to remember them going through note reading at the same time as introducing the notes themselves.

Otherwise, perhaps things move more slowly here at the very beginning (to give time to cover more of the basic theory)?

I always think that part of the English thing about sightreading is that people are just expected to be able to do it, and it's in the exam syllabuses. (And in contrast, the French sightsing.)

I think it's fascinating how different countries have different attitudes to musical education.

(Sorry, slightly OT now)

My daughter has a book called Violin Tutor, it is Hungarian and printed in four languages all at once and she is learning pieces from a book called Wagon Wheels (English).

Yes, sorry also for ambushing the topic. She has been practising more independently though for the past three days. Hooray.

arghh... this w/e I wrote out practice schedules for both children, 3 instruments. The idea was that DS1 knew exactly what was necessary for his exam runup and wouldn't need to find the right page in his notebook or say "But Phin doesn't say that" etc etc, that he would do more focused trumpet practice (as the notes from that are quite minimal), and that DS2 would put in a little more effort on his weaker points.

DS1 looked at my schedules and just said "I can't read them". DS2 read them out to him, I yelled then typed them up on the computer.
Then I stormed out...

The next day, DS1 decided to have a fight over it. Why do I have to practice when you never do? Finally I screamed that having to spend an hour and a half every day supervising other people's practice didn't leave me enough time to do my own.

Then he told me he couldn't play the trumpet pieces because he didn't know them and his teacher hadn't played them to him. Finally I grabbed the instrument and played one myself... this actually did do the trick, amazingly!

*sigh*

DS2 DOES need supervision to check his bow isn't going at a 45 degree angle, so I don't resent that so much. But still... anyone want a used 11 yr old?

You made me laugh!

Can just imagine you belting out the Pink Panther whilst using Flute fingerings on Trumpet (there is an explaination I've not totally lost it).

I'll decline the offer of the used 11 year old nice of you though it is. Mine had the opposite problem at 11 where she wouldn't put an instrument down long enough to get anything else done. Though we have been there with the stubborn phrase and it's not gone for good yet

I can sometimes get away with a comment before practice starts along the lines of " Remember he told you to work on line 3 on its own", but if I say anything once practice starts then I'm interferring.

Felicity really should listen to her amazing flute player mum!!!

We could do a short term swap if you like? I have only just discovered how little life we all have now that Daughter (nearly 11) is practising 3 instruments (plus singing and strange breathing exercises) every day. And the instrument she wants to practice most always seems to be the one that needs practising least! I think a Trumpet might make a pleasant change - and at least it doesn't need to stay in the same room all the time like our much overused piano.


Yeay! Now I know what I want to be able to play on the flute! Actually think my sister may actually be Felicity's mum - she told me the other day that her daughter is no longer allowed to practice when she's in the house because it gives her a headache!

I was only half thinking of Felicity when I wrote this comment This is a public forum so can't enlighten you anymore

I taught myself what distance from the open note each permutation of brass instrument valves was when I was younger, so providing the piece isn't too fast or have too big a range I can quickly work out the fingerings. The sound I make is execrable, though!
You know what he had the nerve to say when I put the instrument down saying "and I can't even play the trumpet"?

"But YOU can sight read, you know I can't!"
The piece had 4 lines, was in 3/4 and G major and had a range of less than an octave.
AND HE'S NOT DOING HIS PRACTICE NOW must rush....

Thanks for the major laugh!

Reminds me a wind-band rehearsal when I was the only woodwind instrument (together with most of the trumpets) still playing at the end of a piece we were sight-reading. The conductor made some remark about me being able to manage when everyone else gave up and one of the saxophonists said:
"It's normal, she's a teacher."
I objected that I teach English not music and she said "That's a minor detail you're still a teacher"
(And this is a woman in her thirties not an 11 year old!)

This reminds me of Son No.2, who has been known to turn round to me in the middle of a practice session and say "Mum - zip it!". In his defence, it's usually when he's getting frustrated because something isn't working (though equally, usually I'm only trying to offer a suggestion as to why it isn't working, and how he can fix it ). Son No.1 is considerably more tolerant...

My daughter is 17, and has been offered places at Huddersfield and York St John to do a music degree. She still has to be nagged to practice, but once started, is more than able to practice without supervision. If I point out that I practice more that she does, I just get told I don't have to revise for A Levels, do homework,catch the bus to and from school, and work on more than one instrument! (Plus have a social life!) I can only hope that being at uni with other muso's does the trick.
Mind you, I remember my Mum saying the same to me, and me stroppily pointing out that I was trying to do A Levels, and learn lead swan in Swan Lake (plus have a social life!) What goes around comes around!!

How about still needs to be nagged, but once started, is more than able to play an infinite number of pieces distantly related to various sections of scales and arpeggios, every piece of music ever heard over the past decade, variations on same, improvisations, latest "compositions in progress", and various singalong parodies - current favorite is from "Springtime for Hitler"...."springtime for nuclear energy, winter for the whole damned economy...we'll raise the roof again, let off some steam again) but not, no, never, EVER the exam pieces or anything else with an educational flavor.

Aware that he is not a prize pupil, he says nothing of all of this to his piano teacher, who remarked recently that it was a pity he wasn't the type to improvise at the keyboard. Didn't know where to look....just emitted a kind of strangled bathetic "Aah..." and RAN.

Perhaps a support group is needed for mothers of 17 year olds!

After 7 years.... my flute playing daughter is practicing ALL THE TIME, without being prompted. She said today "I am just enjoying playing my flute so much at the moment". WOW......
Unfortunately, she is supposed to be revising for her last AS exam next week..... but well... it's only critical thinking so it doesn't matter.... apparently.... I hope?
I think a flute stand is helping. She has put flute in her room, with music stand, and I keep hearing some really lovely music floating down the stairs.....

Would like DD2 to practice with as much enthusiasm as it is DD2 with the exam this term.

You have to revise for critical thinking? My own 17 year old has assured me it's not necessary

Only practise is being done here too, although possibly not as much as is actually necessary...

Critical Thinking????