Dads: When and how did you start teaching your kids to mix and/or scratch?

[smiTTTen]

You mean like this?

[HigherFi]

Mine's four, and I let him loose on the MC6000 whenever he wants. No so much on the turntables.

[photojojo]

Nice to see he's wearing the proper safety clothing. My 17 year old son has no interest whatsoever in mixing, but he digs like a fiend. My 14 year old daughter has a little and she plays around some. She's not as interested in finding music like my son, but is 100% fully committed to percussion in school. Because of this she plays around with some production apps on the iPad, but nothing to serious. When it comes to getting my kids involved in my hobbies I've never pushed them, but always made sure I was available to help them if they were interested.

[MrAybar]

The lad is music obsessed. We got him an ipod shuffle for Christmas and he jams around with Stevie Wonder mostly. He's also partial to some jazzier drum and bass and is a fan of good solid house music too. He'll end up doing something musical whether its Djing, singing or playing an instrument as he's also obsessed with drums (but we arent having those in the house quite yet!).

This was from April 2011.

This made my day!!!!!! Happy New Year!!!!!!!!!!!!

[bigbeatzz]

I've let my 2 boys use my decks with supervision since before they could walk. They are now 3 and 5 and know the basics of what the mixer and decks do. They know volume, crossfading, what the pitch does, how to start and stop the decks and can do little baby scratches. I don't force it on them but whenever they want to get on I supervise and teach as they touch.

[HighTopFade]

I didn't know how to explain a lot of things well. So, I had my kid watch online DJ Shortee instructional videos.

[Tha Gooch]

I make sure my son wears one of those safety vests when he plays in traffic. My 17 year old daughter has a turntable, collects vinyl, enjoys sharing new music with people, spends hours making playlists for friends and events taking care to make sure there are nice tempo transitions and the music flows well together but swears she has no interest in being a Dj. My 8 year old son shows interest but I'm afraid to let him near the TT's so I keep him and my nephews entertained by loading up the Maschine with fart samples.

[smiTTTen]

so what I am hearing is that I am the only one stupid enough to let a four year near a set of 1200s!

[Tha Gooch]

The flip side of that is that we're just selfish pricks who don't want to share with our kids?

[Emery]

You're brave smittten! I love how interested he is in the TTs, but the whole time I watched the vid I was also whispering to myself "watch the needles!" I dont have a kid, but It reminds me of when my friends want to "scratch" my records. Normally I dont mind as long as they dont hit the damn needle! I actually think your son is a better listener than my drunk friends