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The metaphor that resonates with me as a musician, would you expect someone to get better at piano only by attending lessons but no practice at home? Im not su

The metaphor that resonates with me as a musician, would you expect someone to get better at piano only by attending lessons but no practice at home? Im not sure where you get the idea of poor time use from. Out of that 8 hours you need to fit lunch, recess, cumulative transition times, and at least 4 major academic topics (Math, Science, History, Language) plus hopefully a rotating time dedicated to the arts. And you want that to fit into 8 hours on top of the practice required to achieve mastery? Finally, this is me making a value judgement. Just picking one class, math, I'll go out on a limb and say mastery of basic arithmetic is going to resonate much farther in a child's life than participating an extra hour in extra curricular or chores.

jerf 11y ago
"The metaphor that resonates with me as a musician, would you expect someone to get better at piano only by attending lessons but no practice at home?" If they were at lessons for 7 hours a day, five days a week... yes! Yes I in fact do.
- lordCarbonFiber 11y ago
  Except children don't sit down at school and begin a "school lesson". Basic education is going to cover Math, Science, Language, History and hopefully Art. So in a given subject there might be 5 hours of lesson time week. When framed that way, asking for another hour or 2 of practice time for mastery doesn't sound so unreasonable.
  - talmand 11y ago
    Assuming that the homework is "practice" and not "instruction". A good bit of my older kid's homework is continuation of the instruction at home without the benefit of the teacher. Not that I fully blame the teacher for this, I blame the district for it as much, if not more. But to continue the metaphor, I would expect a child receiving five one-hour lessons a week on piano to be proficient enough to show they have received lessons within a decent amount of time. Without extra practice. But what's the criteria to consider it a success? What amount of time? Do we consider whether the child has a natural talent for it in the equation? Personally, I don't think it's a good metaphor.
bweitzman 11y ago
1 hour a day, every day, of each of the subjects you listed should be plenty. Anyways, anything longer than that is difficult for adults to pay attention to, let alone children. If you had an hour per day of instruction/guided practice at the piano, you would absolutely get better. You probably wouldn't become a virtuoso, but the school system isn't designed to make people into virtuosos. That requires more practice.

jerf 11y ago

"The metaphor that resonates with me as a musician, would you expect someone to get better at piano only by attending lessons but no practice at home?" If they were at lessons for 7 hours a day, five days a week... yes! Yes I in fact do.

lordCarbonFiber 11y ago
Except children don't sit down at school and begin a "school lesson". Basic education is going to cover Math, Science, Language, History and hopefully Art. So in a given subject there might be 5 hours of lesson time week. When framed that way, asking for another hour or 2 of practice time for mastery doesn't sound so unreasonable.
- talmand 11y ago
  Assuming that the homework is "practice" and not "instruction". A good bit of my older kid's homework is continuation of the instruction at home without the benefit of the teacher. Not that I fully blame the teacher for this, I blame the district for it as much, if not more. But to continue the metaphor, I would expect a child receiving five one-hour lessons a week on piano to be proficient enough to show they have received lessons within a decent amount of time. Without extra practice. But what's the criteria to consider it a success? What amount of time? Do we consider whether the child has a natural talent for it in the equation? Personally, I don't think it's a good metaphor.

bweitzman 11y ago

1 hour a day, every day, of each of the subjects you listed should be plenty. Anyways, anything longer than that is difficult for adults to pay attention to, let alone children. If you had an hour per day of instruction/guided practice at the piano, you would absolutely get better. You probably wouldn't become a virtuoso, but the school system isn't designed to make people into virtuosos. That requires more practice.