My child is at a conservatory now and wishes we had switched DC from our local, sweet teacher to what became the hardcore, pre-professional teacher at age 8. We did it at 10 and in retrospect, it was a mistake. However, we had no idea what we were doing and kid was very happy with placement at the time. In your shoes and reading this thread now, I would make a move to switch to a high level, private teacher (not a school). Good luck!

If your child doesn't put in practice time, it doesn't matter how awesome the teacher is.

My teachers could immediately tell if I didn't practice. Once or twice they showed me the door and told me to come back when I practiced enough.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Convenient location is important but I would rank violin teacher as equally or more important.

Don't take viola lessons from a violinist. Don't take violin lessons from a violist (btdt).

Find a violin teacher for your DC.

My kids take violin from a viola player (obviously she can play the violin too, but she plays the viola professionally). It hasn’t been an issue at all. Curious why you think it would be. (For context, DD is currently in 3rd grade & about the finish Suzuki Book 3, so not super advanced but not a beginner either. She also plays in an unrelated orchestra, so gets some outside input that way & she’s advanced pretty quickly with no suggestion that her fundamentals aren’t solid.)

Just wanted to say that as a fellow Suzuki parent, almost done with Book 3 in 3rd grade is pretty super advanced in my book. Like, not prodigy level obviously, but basically as advanced as normal kid gets assuming you’re at a studio that takes Suzuki mastery seriously.

I was ok book 6 at that age

NP, but if you were on book 6 violin in 3rd grade, you were either a prodigy or at a studio that didn’t take the mastery side seriously. Did you play full book concerts entirely memorized at the end of each book? Because there are not many kids in the 4-7 age range who can do that for the longer books if they race through learning 1 a week even setting aside violin playing. My kids play with a very serious Suzuki studio and I’ve only met one kid ever who was honestly capable of playing Book 6 well in 3rd grade… and she’s now won international awards.

A little bit of an outlier, but not an extreme one. YouTube is full of 7 year olds playing professional concerti (I exaggerate, but not much). DD's current studio has a 9 year old playing Bruch 3rd movement. The astonishing thing, besides the fact that she is playing it well, is that she has been learning the violin for a grand total of 2 years. My daughter, who started at the same age, took 6 years to get there. In this area especially, I find that there are a lot of kids of all stripes that are quite advanced for their age.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Convenient location is important but I would rank violin teacher as equally or more important.

Don't take viola lessons from a violinist. Don't take violin lessons from a violist (btdt).

Find a violin teacher for your DC.

My kids take violin from a viola player (obviously she can play the violin too, but she plays the viola professionally). It hasn’t been an issue at all. Curious why you think it would be. (For context, DD is currently in 3rd grade & about the finish Suzuki Book 3, so not super advanced but not a beginner either. She also plays in an unrelated orchestra, so gets some outside input that way & she’s advanced pretty quickly with no suggestion that her fundamentals aren’t solid.)

Just wanted to say that as a fellow Suzuki parent, almost done with Book 3 in 3rd grade is pretty super advanced in my book. Like, not prodigy level obviously, but basically as advanced as normal kid gets assuming you’re at a studio that takes Suzuki mastery seriously.

I was ok book 6 at that age

NP, but if you were on book 6 violin in 3rd grade, you were either a prodigy or at a studio that didn’t take the mastery side seriously. Did you play full book concerts entirely memorized at the end of each book? Because there are not many kids in the 4-7 age range who can do that for the longer books if they race through learning 1 a week even setting aside violin playing. My kids play with a very serious Suzuki studio and I’ve only met one kid ever who was honestly capable of playing Book 6 well in 3rd grade… and she’s now won international awards.

Now, when you post here. We’ve changed a few times for different reasons.

Find a teacher belongs to your state music teacher association (e.g. https://nvmta.org/) that follows state teacher association's test on sight reading, music theory and performance festivals. You don't need a mathematician to teach 1st grade math, but you do need a teacher that follows the rigor of a standard.

For something like violin where setup is really important, I would go with a violin teacher who plays the violin. So, in your shoes, I'd switch.

My daughter started violin at 7, and we switched teachers when we felt that she had gone as far as she could with her first teacher. When we did trial lessons with new teachers, none of them had anything significantly bad to say about her setup, how she had been taught, or what she had been taught. Not having to undo bad habits is extremely important. We are always grateful for that, because we see other students of her new teacher that have significant deficiencies, and it's like you have to take 10 steps back before you can move forward again.

You sound like you want to make the change but don't want to deal with the time and financial commitment. Why are you posting this? You're going to parent how you see fit what does anyone else's opinion matter? This is such a weird question I mean if you think your current teacher isn't suitable then change! I have a strong musical background and made sure my kids had teachers from conservatory. I pay a lot and have to drive a long way. It's my choice to do this because I have a background from conservatory but plenty of people wouldn't. There's no wrong or right just preference. Do what you want to do! No teacher will make you kid a star if that's what you're hoping though. If they duck they won't keep up and the teacher will not be effective if the kid doesn't have the passion for it. Teachers have to match the student. I used to teach and laughed at all the parents who thought I automatically can work magic with students. Some were worth my best, some were not going to be able to handle it.

+1 to staying with a close and nurturing teacher that your kid likes. I would stay until the kid or teacher says its time to move on. That's what we did for my piano player who is now in a music conservatory - after the first teacher, I let DS have say in the teacher and their style since he was the one who had to go to lessons and practice. He had 3 teachers in childhood- the first nurturing one who taught him how to play, a move to a "real" teacher that was more strict but not too strict and a final move in high school to a real piano studio with competition and professional bent.

OP, does your son want to practice more? Moving to a more intense teacher will mean more practicing and practicing more seriously.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Convenient location is important but I would rank violin teacher as equally or more important.

Don't take viola lessons from a violinist. Don't take violin lessons from a violist (btdt).

Find a violin teacher for your DC.

My kids take violin from a viola player (obviously she can play the violin too, but she plays the viola professionally). It hasn’t been an issue at all. Curious why you think it would be. (For context, DD is currently in 3rd grade & about the finish Suzuki Book 3, so not super advanced but not a beginner either. She also plays in an unrelated orchestra, so gets some outside input that way & she’s advanced pretty quickly with no suggestion that her fundamentals aren’t solid.)

Just wanted to say that as a fellow Suzuki parent, almost done with Book 3 in 3rd grade is pretty super advanced in my book. Like, not prodigy level obviously, but basically as advanced as normal kid gets assuming you’re at a studio that takes Suzuki mastery seriously.

I was ok book 6 at that age

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Convenient location is important but I would rank violin teacher as equally or more important.

Don't take viola lessons from a violinist. Don't take violin lessons from a violist (btdt).

Find a violin teacher for your DC.

My kids take violin from a viola player (obviously she can play the violin too, but she plays the viola professionally). It hasn’t been an issue at all. Curious why you think it would be. (For context, DD is currently in 3rd grade & about the finish Suzuki Book 3, so not super advanced but not a beginner either. She also plays in an unrelated orchestra, so gets some outside input that way & she’s advanced pretty quickly with no suggestion that her fundamentals aren’t solid.)

Just wanted to say that as a fellow Suzuki parent, almost done with Book 3 in 3rd grade is pretty super advanced in my book. Like, not prodigy level obviously, but basically as advanced as normal kid gets assuming you’re at a studio that takes Suzuki mastery seriously.

I would stay put for now, but plan to switch in a couple years. At this age it just needs to be encouraging and enjoyable.
My kid plays a different instrument (woodwind) and the most important thing about her gentle teacher is that the teacher knows how to teach - how to describe the mouth and tongue shape so it makes sense, how to hear the difference in sounds, etc. A teacher who can't do that is not much help, even if rigorous.

Also, I used to say I wished somebody had pushed me on my instrument (piano) because I took neighborhood lessons for 12 years yet am not very good. But then I saw how DD10 will play for an hour unprompted, and realized that pushing me wouldn't have done much because the interest and drive weren't there.

Anonymous wrote:Convenient location is important but I would rank violin teacher as equally or more important.

Don't take viola lessons from a violinist. Don't take violin lessons from a violist (btdt).

Find a violin teacher for your DC.

My kids take violin from a viola player (obviously she can play the violin too, but she plays the viola professionally). It hasn’t been an issue at all. Curious why you think it would be. (For context, DD is currently in 3rd grade & about the finish Suzuki Book 3, so not super advanced but not a beginner either. She also plays in an unrelated orchestra, so gets some outside input that way & she’s advanced pretty quickly with no suggestion that her fundamentals aren’t solid.)

My DS started at 6 with a serious teacher. He was driven/talented for his age and he learned the most from that teacher. However after a year, the teacher wanted more than DS could do (there's lots of driven and talented kids), so we switched to someone who sounds like your current teacher. He likes her. He's 9 now and still with her. I do think she is reactive/passive, so we did trial lessons with another teacher last year and almost switched. Rapport matters a lot though - he's still with the same passive teacher.