7 ms·

It's an immense amount of effort to do it consistently. And it gets harder with each kid, at least for me. One of the things you figure out is that some kids a

It's an immense amount of effort to do it consistently. And it gets harder with each kid, at least for me. One of the things you figure out is that some kids aren't interested. And if your kid isn't interested in thinking about prime numbers, you're going to be hard pressed to change that. Conversely they will have interests that you don't share, and it's going to be harder for you to participate meaningfully in that beyond being generally supportive. They are individuals that way.

jimbokun 9y ago
My teenage son is a musician and is taking AP Music Theory right now. I ask him to tell me about what he is learning, and he patiently tries to explain it to me, but I just nod along because I have no idea what he's talking about.
- jamiepenney 9y ago
  Don't feel bad about that! My dad didn't know what the hell I was talking about when I was learning C++ as a teenager, but he asked anyway because he saw I got excited about it.
  - nitrogen 9y ago
    Wow, more parents should be like that! I'm not a parent, but I try to do the same kind of thing for friends and coworkers in hopes of spreading the idea that others' interests are worth attention and respect even if you don't share them.
  - AbacusAvenger 9y ago
    My mom certainly does that for me. I try to explain non-intuitive programming concepts to her with analogies, but I don't think I succeed most of the time. I love her dearly for putting up with it, though.
- steamer25 9y ago
  The gist of music theory: It sounds interesting when sounds with simple frequency ratios are played at the same time. E.g., playing a 440 Hz tone at the same time and 660 Hz tone has a 2:3 ratio. Some combinations of frequencies, when played before or after other combos can establish an expectation and then either fulfill it or negate it. E.g., if you take the ratio above and then play 440 + 587, it'll sound like it's moving forward and that the second combo has 'arrived' as you might have expected. The 587 is derived by fixing the first note but inverting the relationship from 2:3 to 3:2 (and then doubling the frequency of the second so you don't have to move so far from 660). Most everything beyond is attaching labels to the frequencies and combos. Just as we have names for frequencies of light (red, yellow, blue) and patterns (gradient, checkerboard) there are names for frequencies of sound (A, C#, E) and their combinations (major, minor). There are also more esoteric terms (chiaroscuro in painting, neapolitan flat 9 in music) for people who've spent so much time on a subject that the basics have become boring. Oh, and there's also divisions of and patterns for time in music theory. E.g., "hold this note for twice as many milliseconds as the previous one". There have been some good resources here on HN: https://hn.algolia.com/?query=music%20theory&sort=byPopularity&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?query=music%20theory&sort=byPopulari...
  - andrepd 9y ago
    That's the gist of music theory as much as "radiation in the order of ~100nm excites your retina and you see colour" is the gist of photography or painting. x) It's the fundamental physical explanation, but there's a world of complexity and subtlety that eludes such a "first principles" explanation.
    - steamer25 9y ago
      I agree that to fully appreciate musical qualities, you have to play around with sound and that text alone won't suffice. On the other hand, your description of radiation hitting the retina might be a decent primer on color theory which has about as much to do with photography and painting as music theory has to do with playing an instrument. My goal was to demystify the jargon by showing that it has very tangible definitions which can be understood by even analytical audiences like HN (of which I include myself).
- thinkpad20 9y ago
  If you’re interested in the subject, look up Adam Neely on YouTube. A great channel with a series of 10-minuteish videos on various interesting topics in music, from theory to history to physics and beyond. Not so much a “course” in music theory, morning e of a series of one-off topics mostly accessible by a lay audience. Might be good conversation starters with your son :)
- steamer25 9y ago
  I was replying to another sub-thread here and had another thought: It might be easier for your son to express what he's learning if you can catch him while he's got e.g., a piano or guitar at hand. Humans have a hard time generating compound musical waveforms using just their bodies/vocal-folds (though it can be done to a limited extent as in Mongolian throat singing). Having him play the sounds as he explains them will probably also help cement the concepts in his own understanding ;) .
icc97 9y ago
Yes, it's notable that Brent's son first was interested enough to ask him and then stayed interested as he explained. You can't start telling your child about maths if they're busy doing something else. All you can do is wait for a moment when their curiosity spots something and try to feed that. Even when you catch their interest it's easy to break it if you can't explain it, so los of kudos to Brent for navigating it perfectly.
hycaria 9y ago
>And it gets harder with each kid, at least for me. That is the most depressing thing I've read in a good while.
- nickpeterson 9y ago
  Yeah, but I find it's true. I think that's why the first born tends to be, at least historically, the most important child. Because parents spend the most focused attention on them. If it feels better though, as the youngest of three children, I find I was allowed to wander a bit more, and that has actually proved useful.
  - slx26 9y ago
    Well, when you are not the first, most of the time you end up learning a lot from your brothers/sisters. You are almost always the first for someone in the family.
  - hycaria 9y ago
    Then why bother if you're not even trying
minor3rd 9y ago
> One of the things you figure out is that some kids aren't interested. And if your kid isn't interested in thinking about prime numbers, you're going to be hard pressed to change that. Conversely they will have interests that you don't share, and it's going to be harder for you to participate meaningfully in that beyond being generally supportive. They are individuals that way. I grew up in a family with 7 kids and my youngest sibling is just 12 years old. I remember when my younger set of siblings were born, I was thinking "I'm going to teach them EVERYTHING I've learned at a young age, and they will be way ahead of their peers." I failed to grasp just how much of their personality is ingrained in them from their DNA and that they might not have all the same interests as me. It was a great learning experience though -- when I do have kids, I'm not going to try and shove my interests down their throat. I'm going to pay attention to what they are drawn to and give them as many resources as I can so they can pursue that interest as much as they desire.
- virtuabhi 9y ago
  > how much of their personality is ingrained in them from their DNA Is this really true? I hope not!
  - khedoros1 9y ago
    I don't think that personality is completely hard-wired, but different people will strongly tend toward different traits, and two people raised in an identical environment will react differently to that environment. Interests can be encouraged because there's some flexibility in someone's natural tendencies. It's the old "nature vs nurture" discussion, about which one dominates the other.
    - singingboyo 9y ago
      Not to mention that siblings by definition each grow up in a different environment. The addition of a new sibling changes the behaviour of parents and other siblings (sometimes a lot, sometimes a little, but it's there). Perhaps the above poster's sibling looked for other interests because the poster had already 'taken' whatever interests they were sharing. But perhaps not - it's hard (impossible?) to know.

jimbokun 9y ago

My teenage son is a musician and is taking AP Music Theory right now. I ask him to tell me about what he is learning, and he patiently tries to explain it to me, but I just nod along because I have no idea what he's talking about.

jamiepenney 9y ago
Don't feel bad about that! My dad didn't know what the hell I was talking about when I was learning C++ as a teenager, but he asked anyway because he saw I got excited about it.
- nitrogen 9y ago
  Wow, more parents should be like that! I'm not a parent, but I try to do the same kind of thing for friends and coworkers in hopes of spreading the idea that others' interests are worth attention and respect even if you don't share them.
- AbacusAvenger 9y ago
  My mom certainly does that for me. I try to explain non-intuitive programming concepts to her with analogies, but I don't think I succeed most of the time. I love her dearly for putting up with it, though.
steamer25 9y ago
The gist of music theory: It sounds interesting when sounds with simple frequency ratios are played at the same time. E.g., playing a 440 Hz tone at the same time and 660 Hz tone has a 2:3 ratio. Some combinations of frequencies, when played before or after other combos can establish an expectation and then either fulfill it or negate it. E.g., if you take the ratio above and then play 440 + 587, it'll sound like it's moving forward and that the second combo has 'arrived' as you might have expected. The 587 is derived by fixing the first note but inverting the relationship from 2:3 to 3:2 (and then doubling the frequency of the second so you don't have to move so far from 660). Most everything beyond is attaching labels to the frequencies and combos. Just as we have names for frequencies of light (red, yellow, blue) and patterns (gradient, checkerboard) there are names for frequencies of sound (A, C#, E) and their combinations (major, minor). There are also more esoteric terms (chiaroscuro in painting, neapolitan flat 9 in music) for people who've spent so much time on a subject that the basics have become boring. Oh, and there's also divisions of and patterns for time in music theory. E.g., "hold this note for twice as many milliseconds as the previous one". There have been some good resources here on HN: https://hn.algolia.com/?query=music%20theory&sort=byPopularity&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?query=music%20theory&sort=byPopulari...
- andrepd 9y ago
  That's the gist of music theory as much as "radiation in the order of ~100nm excites your retina and you see colour" is the gist of photography or painting. x) It's the fundamental physical explanation, but there's a world of complexity and subtlety that eludes such a "first principles" explanation.
  - steamer25 9y ago
    I agree that to fully appreciate musical qualities, you have to play around with sound and that text alone won't suffice. On the other hand, your description of radiation hitting the retina might be a decent primer on color theory which has about as much to do with photography and painting as music theory has to do with playing an instrument. My goal was to demystify the jargon by showing that it has very tangible definitions which can be understood by even analytical audiences like HN (of which I include myself).
thinkpad20 9y ago
If you’re interested in the subject, look up Adam Neely on YouTube. A great channel with a series of 10-minuteish videos on various interesting topics in music, from theory to history to physics and beyond. Not so much a “course” in music theory, morning e of a series of one-off topics mostly accessible by a lay audience. Might be good conversation starters with your son :)
steamer25 9y ago
I was replying to another sub-thread here and had another thought: It might be easier for your son to express what he's learning if you can catch him while he's got e.g., a piano or guitar at hand. Humans have a hard time generating compound musical waveforms using just their bodies/vocal-folds (though it can be done to a limited extent as in Mongolian throat singing). Having him play the sounds as he explains them will probably also help cement the concepts in his own understanding ;) .

icc97 9y ago

Yes, it's notable that Brent's son first was interested enough to ask him and then stayed interested as he explained. You can't start telling your child about maths if they're busy doing something else. All you can do is wait for a moment when their curiosity spots something and try to feed that. Even when you catch their interest it's easy to break it if you can't explain it, so los of kudos to Brent for navigating it perfectly.

hycaria 9y ago

>And it gets harder with each kid, at least for me. That is the most depressing thing I've read in a good while.

nickpeterson 9y ago
Yeah, but I find it's true. I think that's why the first born tends to be, at least historically, the most important child. Because parents spend the most focused attention on them. If it feels better though, as the youngest of three children, I find I was allowed to wander a bit more, and that has actually proved useful.
- slx26 9y ago
  Well, when you are not the first, most of the time you end up learning a lot from your brothers/sisters. You are almost always the first for someone in the family.
- hycaria 9y ago
  Then why bother if you're not even trying

minor3rd 9y ago

> One of the things you figure out is that some kids aren't interested. And if your kid isn't interested in thinking about prime numbers, you're going to be hard pressed to change that. Conversely they will have interests that you don't share, and it's going to be harder for you to participate meaningfully in that beyond being generally supportive. They are individuals that way. I grew up in a family with 7 kids and my youngest sibling is just 12 years old. I remember when my younger set of siblings were born, I was thinking "I'm going to teach them EVERYTHING I've learned at a young age, and they will be way ahead of their peers." I failed to grasp just how much of their personality is ingrained in them from their DNA and that they might not have all the same interests as me. It was a great learning experience though -- when I do have kids, I'm not going to try and shove my interests down their throat. I'm going to pay attention to what they are drawn to and give them as many resources as I can so they can pursue that interest as much as they desire.

virtuabhi 9y ago
> how much of their personality is ingrained in them from their DNA Is this really true? I hope not!
- khedoros1 9y ago
  I don't think that personality is completely hard-wired, but different people will strongly tend toward different traits, and two people raised in an identical environment will react differently to that environment. Interests can be encouraged because there's some flexibility in someone's natural tendencies. It's the old "nature vs nurture" discussion, about which one dominates the other.
  - singingboyo 9y ago
    Not to mention that siblings by definition each grow up in a different environment. The addition of a new sibling changes the behaviour of parents and other siblings (sometimes a lot, sometimes a little, but it's there). Perhaps the above poster's sibling looked for other interests because the poster had already 'taken' whatever interests they were sharing. But perhaps not - it's hard (impossible?) to know.