- what age would you start? DD1 started a couple of weeks after she turned four.

- what instruments are best to start with? We went with piano for her as she already loved it. She taught herself to play simple tunes (like one handed twinkle twinkle) and we decided to give formal lessons a go before she could teach herself bad habits.

- do you have opinions or experience with models of learning? I think the tunes they learn are necessary but they are so boring. We counteract that at home - I teach her some fun things that she can muck around with too so she doesn't go crazy with the book.

- do you need to insist on or push for daily practice? I imagine that few children volunteer to screech away at an amateur and tuneless 'twinkle twinkle' for 30 mins a day, but when learning an instrument is such a technical skill, this level of practice is required to make it happen. You have to be a bit rubbish, and put in a whole lot of hard yards to become accomplished. Can this be achieved in a 'gentle', respectful or child-led way?

Yes and no. Some days she sits down on her own and practices her entire book. Other days she ditches the book and practices things I've taught her like chopsticks. We don't nag her, don't want to make it a chore but once a week I make sure she practices the latest song she learned in her lesson. She's really keen so we generally let her lead the way.

- anything to add on your experience? I always ask her if she had fun after her lesson. We do it on a week by week basis and because she is young, we want it to be fun. The music school had their reservations about enrolling her (and I didn't let on that she was just turning 4 when I enrolled her) as they thought we had unreasonable expectations and she was too young, but one term in she has surprised them all and is keeping up with kids two years older. I think the key is to make sure it's fun and that they are musically inclined. DD1 has been doing mini maestros since she was about 18 months and loves all sorts of music so it seemed a natural way to go.