Honestly we didn’t “force” practice during our DS’s first year of piano. We wanted to avoid making him hate it and tune out altogether (no pun intended). His teacher also didn’t force practice. Year two felt like a natural point to start asking him to practice regularly. He had quite a bit of foundational work under his belt and a few songs he enjoyed playing on his own (unrequested). At this point he didn’t push back on practice as much.

Anonymous wrote:second grader, piano since K. The teacher requires practice every day at least as long as class time, so in K he had 30 min lesson, so 30 min practice every day, now he is having hour long lessons, he should practice one hour every day.

Of course he has other activities, it is hard to keep one hour every day. On a sport night we might only try 30 min.

Warming up scales and finger practice takes at least 10 min. Then getting into weekly assignments and sometimes diddling around. The kid got into it only after 20 min.

wow, that's really good progress. what system / level is he on?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OMG. Please don’t force your 7 yr old to practice more than once per week. What is wrong with you?

I hope you're joking

Of course I’m not. Who in the right mind would force a 7 yr old to play violin every day- if they don’t want to. Is this for their benefit or yours?

If you're not willing to enforce practice time for a 7-year-old, then music lessons are clearly not right for your family. I taught a kid who never practiced, and it was awful--week to week he would fail to improve, and I really questioned what the point of it was. I was really happy when COVID came along and I could easily justify ending lessons with him. Complete waste of my time. You simply cannot learn to play an instrument without regular, daily practice.

That said, unless the child shows enormous promise and motivation, long hours of practice are not necessary. 15-20 minutes of focused practice ought to be necessary. And for context, it would be ridiculous to say that a 7-year-old shouldn't be required to read or do math for 15-20 minutes daily. Why should music lessons be different?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OMG. Please don’t force your 7 yr old to practice more than once per week. What is wrong with you?

I hope you're joking

Of course I’m not. Who in the right mind would force a 7 yr old to play violin every day- if they don’t want to. Is this for their benefit or yours?

My 7 yo also doesn't want to shower, bush her teeth or hair or go to school. Keep it in perspective.

She picked violin as her activity, but that doesn't mean she likes to practice, just as many adults don't like to practice. As her parent I get to make sure certain tasks are done daily, including both teeth brushing and violin. If she stops wanting to play, that's different, but as long as she's taking lessons then she needs to practice most days.

+1. It's also about teaching your kid, at a time when the demands are gentle, that sometimes wanting something means you have to work for it in ways that aren't fun. My daughter wants to play the violin, she's happy when she gets better, but she doesn't always want to practice because she's seven. She also wants to own a cat, but doesn't usually want to feed it or clean out the litterboxes. As a parent, I remind her so she can learn the connection between the thing she wants and the work it takes to get there. The fifteen minutes she spends practicing or the five minutes she spends on cat care doesn't keep her from having a happy childhood or anything.