I don't believe in forcing children into music. I think everyone should have a certain amount of education in it in order to appreciate it better, but playing an instrument is hard and without an internal passion to want to pursue it the result is joyless, so what would be the point? I let Aden beg me for a year to take violin before I finally pulled one off the shelf at the violin store for her and got her a teacher. (And no, I don't teach her myself because that is fraught with danger, plus I think a relationship with a music teacher is special and I don't want to deprive her of that.) Mona started violin because Aden plays violin, which isn't the ideal motivation, however there's nothing wrong with it either. They both enjoy it, and though Quinn has happily sat in my lap to watch them practice, he never expressed any interest in trying it himself.
But then came the report card. A few categories marked less than perfect and Quinn was on a mission. We conquered shapes and we conquered oceans because the boy likes to check things off a list. Then he wanted to conquer music.
