OPC... Other People's Children

rant

DS1, now 7, shares a music class with a 10yo girl. She is just rude, mainly
because she has been allowed to get her own way too much, but in part because
her lack of practising does tend to become apparent in class. The presence of
her Mum makes no difference to her behaviour; in fact, it may make it slightly
worse. I couldn't tell you if she really likes doing music or not and frankly
suspect that she wouldn't be able to answer that question honestly any more,
because she is using the music class to pursue another agenda.

Today, she stuck with all her usual foot-dragging and disruption. That is,
when the teacher told them to sit on the floor she played a few bars on the
keyboard first -- every time. When told to do *anything* she mucks around
with the keyboard first, including starting the automatic arpeggios or putting
the volume up. When the teacher wants them to practice their fingering on the
floor, she doesn't do it. You can guess what her Mum does to stop this
behaviour.

Anyway, the teacher had one child play the left hand, and the other the right,
of one of their current pieces. First, DS played left hand while Madam played
right. But when DS was to play right hand, Madam played it far too fast. She
was told to play it slowly -- and played it far too fast again. Last chance
-- and she still played it way too fast.

Her Mum said, "I think we'd better go home if you are going to act like this."
[Oh please, please! I think to myself.]
"Noooo!" One little whine and Mum pipes down.
Did the behaviour improve at all for the rest of the lesson?
Noooo! Same old stuffing around, refusing to cooperate, playing so loudly
that DS (who sits behind her) couldn't hear the teacher's playing, and so on.
I am so sick of it, and I get extra annoyed watching the mother threaten and
fail to follow through!

Last year was almost as bad; we had a skittish little boy in the class with
*his* feckless mother!

Please excuse me while I go and bang my head on a wall a few times. I don't
know how the teacher copes, I really don't!

/rant

--
Chookie -- Sydney, Australia
(Replace "foulspambegone" with "optushome" to reply)

http://chookiesbackyard.blogspot.com/