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I love to laugh and love with my family, read, exercise, cook and sew, all the while giving thanks to God for his immeasureable love and faithfulness to me.

Thursday, February 24, 2011

Update on the violin

As an FYI, her teacher is the one who adds the stickers (which serve as a visual reminder for various things).  Initially it made me a nervous wreck putting stickers on the violin...even if we are renting!  Buuut, she said it was o.k., so who am I to go against the teacher?!
Back in the beginning of December we decided to sign the Noodle up for Suzuki violin.  I wasn't sure how it would go, but I have to say that I am thrilled with how she has taken to it.  For those of you who aren't as familiar with the Suzuki method, you can read here to better understand.  Most afternoons when we practice, she is a willing and able little participant.  She seems to really enjoy the time and is eager to improve and show her teacher what she has been working on over the past week. 
She takes her practicing very seriously and is all about handling the violin in the correct way.  Again, thank goodness, because I get nervous handling it!!

At this time, we usually practice for about 20 minutes.  That's enough to get through what her teacher wants her to work on each week and is generally about the maximum amount of time that the Chinese Noodle is willing to give me, especially because it is hard to make those little fingers do what I am asking them to do! 

I know recently there has been lots of coverage over  Amy Chua's "Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother". 
Diane Rhem interviewed her right after the article in the Wall Street Journal came out and she receieved so much publicity.  While I certainly think there is some validity in some of the things she writes about, I don't agree with the techniques she employed to get her daughters to practice.  Um, hello?...threatening to burn stuffed animals and withholding the bathroom...crazy, scary stuff!!  But she does bring up an interesting point...most kids people don't "enjoy" something until they are good at it, and in order to become good, you must practice, practice, practice.  How long do you let a child continue with an activity before you let them quit if they are saying they don't like the activity?  Until the x-number week session is over?  A year?  Until they are old enough to truly understand what they would be giving up?  I'm not sure how I feel about it.  Thoughts?

1 comment:

Andrea said...

Great post! That's a tough one - about knowing when to let it go. I think it comes back to prayer - at least it does for me. Trusting God to let us know when a season needs to begin and end. I think He equips us as parents with an ability to see when our children are just not wanting to put the effort forth vs. it just not being what He created them to do.