I have a class this semester about how to integrate music into the standard elementary classroom, and the professor asked how many of us (elementary education majors) had been made to feel by someone that we shouldn't sing because we had "bad voices". I have never been told this in my life, so I just sat there feeling bad about my years and years of vocal lessons (including many semesters in college). I really hoped, though, that most of these kids hadn't been told that, because I truly believe that singing is as natural as breathing and that everyone should be able to do it and love it, even if they're not trained classical soloists or famous pop singers.
To my disappointment, at least a fifth of this large class raised their hands. Then the professor asked about who got shamed out of playing instruments and there was some overlap with which kids raised their hands for getting shamed for singing but there were some new faces. I'd wager at least a fourth of this class had been told by someone, at some point, that they were bad at music and shouldn't do it.
There were so many kids who were told by their parents, or their teachers, or their friends or whoever in their lives that they shouldn't do something as natural and human as make music because they weren't good at it immediately. They were probably kids when this happened, too. Tiny people with undeveloped vocal chords, told that they shouldn't do something when the mechanism that they use to DO IT hasn't even fully developed. It's like telling a third grader that they're too short to ever be a basketball player. Not only is it terrible to shit on a kids dream, it's also not even something that you know is true because they still have so much growing to do in that area. In third grade you don't even know what a kids' voice is going to sound like as an adult.
But that's still the mentality that we're drilling into them. You aren't good at this now, so you never ever will be. You're short, so you'll never be good at basketball. Right now you sound "bad" so you should never ever sing. Don't ever do something you're not perfect at.
This idea that if you're not The Best TM at something you're embarrassing yourself in front of everyone, making their lives worse, and you should not do it is part of the reason that I curled up in a corner for so much of high school and only tried things that I was good at. And considering that things I'm good at include the arts and not much else, I didn't end up with nearly the versatile skill set that I could have if there wasn't that deeply ingrained mentality that there's something like, morally wrong and deeply embarrassing about doing things that we're not good at. Sometimes I think about the skills that I robbed myself of because of this mentality and I get so mad. That mentality is so toxic.
We can't even GET good at things if we don't start out being bad at them! Especially if we're not prodigies! Or we don't have the access to private lessons or tutoring or all these things that let kids with more money push ahead of kids with less money. Just let kids be themselves and try things without shaming them for not instantly being amazing at them.
One silly way that I plan to do that is to never to go up to the whiteboard and draw something and then tell my students "yes, I know it's bad, but I'm not an artist". I don't think they should have to apologize for doing something while "bad" at it, so I refuse to model that for them. I will try my hardest not to pass that mentality onto my students. I am trying so hard to get over my fear of being bad at things in public and I refuse to contribute to that particular baggage for them.
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