Hey /r/ParentingI grew up taking music lessons from the time I was 4 or 5 up to about 15. A lot of that was violin but mostly it was piano.At 4 my daughter got really interested in piano and asked for lessons. When she was old enough, we started them. Other than a summer break while her teacher left town (she's a college student/music ed major) she's been going for a few months now.In the beginning she loved it to the point where she'd just hop up and practice on her own. She learned her first piece of music pretty quickly and was SO proud of herself.Now, she's in kindergarten. She still cares about piano, and we go once a week for 30 minutes just after school.But school tuckers her out, of course. From 3pm to about 3:45 I can count on having a pleasant and well-behaved child.Then the sleepy/groggy/tiredness creeps in. (Even though she sleeps an average 11 hours at night.)So, I feel like expecting her to sit down and practice piano every day isn't really gonna work.Right now, my tactic is that—provided we remember and we aren't both zapped—I only "make" her commit to 10 minutes of practice on Mondays after school, and I will happily sit and work with her.Even this 10 minutes is HARD. She is SO tired and ends up just goofing off and getting frustrated if we work on her assigned music instead of a Moana song.(I have asked the doctor about her excessive tiredness in the afternoons...I mean circles under her eyes and all...and other than allergies we can't figure it out...)My hope is that by starting small (10 mins once a week, and just practice the same 2-3 measures until we got em...stickers...lots of praise...teaching by example i.e., showing her that if she wants to be able to teach herself Moana she's gotta start with the basics etc) she'll enjoy the feeling of learning a piece (like she did in the beginning) and wanna keep at it.I don't wanna force her into anything. I want her to enjoy it. She still likes going to lessons and picking at the piano, and she hasn't expressed any frustration with learning and playing piano itself. She LOVES the prospect of learning her favorite songs and she just loves music in general...Is 10 mins a week enough? Am I being too soft? She also does homework (1-2 short worksheets a week).I'm just trying to strike a balance between pushing her to accomplish things that make her feel proud of herself...but also not making her feel like all I care about is her doing well in school and playing piano.I'm so glad I spent years playing classical piano but my dad was such an asshole about it. I never want her to feel that way. I only started taking joy in music after I got to own it...she looks so happy when she learns something new on piano so I just want to keep that up but she just seems so tired sometimes and we struggle so much with keeping a consistent schedule.... via /r/Parenting http://ift.tt/2xA5c3U
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