Winton's Ways to Practice

I introduced the concept of practice today. We practiced together as a group, a section at a time and then I set them lose to work on the piece by themselves. I also introduced Winton's Ways to Practice from his Tackling the Monster video.

Wynton’s Ways to Practice

1. Seek Private Instruction.
2. Make a Schedule.
3. Set Goals.
4. Concentrate.
5. Relax and Practice Slowly.
6. Practice Hard Parts Longer.
7. Play with Expression.
8. Learn from Your Mistakes.
9. Don’t show off.
10. Think for Yourself.
11. Be Optimistic.
12. Look for Connections.

The reason most guitar method books are weak is...

...they're written by guitar players. Well, I guess they are. I hate to say it because I am a guitar player, but guitar players are not great with method books. I learned to play out of one of these method books, and I've taught out of them for years but they're weak. Let me tell you why I've come to this conclusion.

1. They move too quickly.
2. They teach new notes in groups of three according to string tuning rather than adding one or two at a time.
3. They begin with modal music that sounds funny.

Most guitar method books begin by teaching E, F and G on the first string. Then, after you've played about a page you move on to B,C and D on the second string. Here, most books will stick with these six notes for a couple of pages. Then, when you're feeling like you can almost do this, they unleash the third string with G and A.

I learned to play the guitar great this way! I began with Mel Bay's Modern Guitar Method Grade 1. I really do have a special place in my heart for this book. I fell in love with this instrument playing through this book. The funny thing is, I didn't even know about chords when I started teaching myself.

I went on to study some classical in college while majoring in music. Years later, when I began to teach private lessons, I was surprised to find that most students didn't have the same experience with this method that I did. They had trouble keeping up and lost interest because they were required to learn so many notes just to play the first couple of pages.

The difference for me was that I was already a musician and highly motivated. I had played the saxophone for three years in band, could read music very well and was already a full-on, passionate music nerd!

Most people who came to me for guitar lessons wanted to learn to play guitar but didn't have the same ability or motivation. I really have always wanted to believe that anyone can learn to play. I set out to find a method that was geared more toward inexperienced musicians.

First, I tried Mel Bay's Mastering the Guitar book which mixes in chords and tab at the same time as the note reading. I figured this would help with the monotony of the note reading. But the note reading section still worked from a 3-notes-at-a-time approach and some students couldn't keep up.

Then, I found Everybody's Guitar Method which after teaching the three notes on the first string, uses an add-one-note-at-a-time process which I was pretty happy with. It definitely helped the pace but had one song per note added; still a little fast.

In a future post I'll explain why I think that a new method is needed for guitar instruction.

The Treble Clef Rap

This is a great way to teach kids the notes of the treble clef. (There's also one for the bass.)Thanks to Chris Young for sharing this at our state choral meeting.

F, A, C, E, F, A, C, E,
These are the spaces I can see
E, G, B, D, F, E, G, B, D, F
These are the lines o the treble clef

You use your hand for the staff and touch the spaces between your fingers as you say the space names. You touch your fingers as you say the lines. It's really great for my special education kids but I do it with everybody and they like it. It's a fun chant they'll remember and it uses kinesthetic learning.

My class guitar grading rubric

October 26, 2010 edit: I have a more recent rubric which can be found here.  It better reflects my current teaching methods.


http://classroomguitar.blogspot.com/2010/01/updated-class-grading-rubicgrading.html

The following is the original 2007 post:

This is the basic rubric I use. I weigh them differently depending on how far along we are and may add others later. For example, the first couple of weeks I might assign 50 points of a playing grade toward the "elbow on the hip" because I really want them to understand the importance of that one.

I give a lot of weight to the first three or four items under technique at the beginning because once they're learned properly the students can play without looking at their fingers and don't have to unlearn nasty habits.

The first week or two I assign about 5 or 10 points total to the general performance items. I've found that if they've got the technique right, these first easy songs will be correct anyway. Most beginner's problems with playing beginner songs correctly stems from their not being able to play notes without looking at their fingers, losing their place because their looking at their fingers and not being able to reach certain notes because of poor Left Hand (LH) technique.

Guitar Playing Rubric

Technique
· Elbow on the ‘hip’ of the guitar. (50 points this week)
· “Thumbs up” – LH thumb behind the neck, pointing up. (20 pts - this is fundamental esp. for small hands)
· Fingertips pressing strings against thumb. (Teacup pinch) (7 pts - this will definitely be higher each week. They have to learn to play with fingertips)
· Fingers spaced to fit the frets (7 pts - this one needs to be increased too. They can't get the 3rd fret note without looking at their hand and sliding unless they learn to feel this finger spread)
· Rest Stroke – RH thumb comes to rest on the string below (6 pts I've got nylon stringed instruments. I would use the thumb even if they weren't. They can feel what they are doing better than with a pick. Also, playing it as a rest stroke teaches them to feel where they are without looking at their fingers)

Musicianship (I'll start hammering these more next week. We're doing them but I'm not grading it yet)
· Looking at music – even if you know it!
· Say the letter names in rhythm
· Tap your foot

General performance (10 pts - This will be fine the first couple of weeks if they're doing the above technique correctly. The songs are just so easy. Technique is the killer!)
· Play rhythm correctly – Steady beat; be sure to hold notes full value
· Play pitches correctly

Good left hand finger spacing

Poor left hand finger spacing

Big Mistake No. 1 (for this year)

I taught some chords first! I gave in to the impulse to get some immediate gratification and just taught some chords. They're just so much more satisfying. I've always done it that way with private lessons. If there is any confusion about playing single note melodies you can give immediate feedback and fix the problem. But what do you do when you've got six kids still strumming multiple strings?

I've only had a problem with it in one class but it's still frustrating. I think the problem stemmed from one thing...

I used stickers this year.

Yeah, you can see them in the pictures. I had to because my first period class is an inclusion class and I have four "special needs" students who really needed it. Then, when I tried to teach them to play individual notes they kept going back to the stickers. ...and strumming multiple strings.

I think we will be able to get them going in a couple of days but if I had the same kids again I probably would begin with the note-reading first. I think it's easier to teach the concept of "those three notes we learned are all in this G chord" than teaching it the other way around.

A couple of these kids will probably never be able to get the note-reading and the others will be behind my regular ed students.

Something to think about:

How do you teach kids within a very wide range of ability levels in a classroom setting?

I don't know if my thinking is correct, but I've basically been giving my more medium level and advanced kids things to work on and letting them practice while I work with others who require more intensive instruction. Also, they're not necessarily working on the same thing at the same time.

I think that this idea can work when teaching beginner guitar because so much of it is just practicing. They have to initially understand the concept but after it's been taught they have to work on learning it kinesthetically through muscle memory. Later, it's more about musicianship, and then, I could see having a problem with this aproach. But the Mattster's open to suggestions. If you have experience with this, please share your ideas with me.

One thing I've gotten out of this is that I'm teaching them some new terms. They are now learning that we 'pick' individual 'notes' and we 'strum' 'chords'. I've also taken the time to notate the chords. This is helpful, even if they can't read all of the notes yet, because it shows them what it looks like on the staff to have more than one note at a time.

Anyway, TGIF!

I told them that if they worked hard I'd give them a free day tomorrow (Saturday). They groaned. I know it's a stale old joke but I'm kind of a stale old guy.

This year's adventure in general music

I'm currently teaching general music classes for the second year at a Middle School in North MS.

This year I have three sections of General Music. Two of them are 7th and 8th graders and the third is 6th grade. This is my first year to teach 6th graders with guitars in General Music and although I didn't expect them to pick it up as quickly as the older kids, I'm surprised by how much more instruction they need.

We're using these little Excel EX 36NBK guitars which we purchased last year mostly with $$ from the class fee paid at the beginning of the school year, being that funds are very limited. We generally get less than $200 per teacher in Mississippi (yes, that's for the year) to spend in the classroom. So, everything else we have to raise ourselves.

They're nylon-string 3/4 size guitars which we were able to purchase for about $40.00 a piece. They retail for $60.00 but we were able to get a discount because we bought 13 of them. They're really sound great for the price.

I've found that the nylon-string instruments' mellow tone and softer volume help minimize the irritation of beginner clanking and minor intonation problems. Although they probably don't stay in tune any better than a cheepo steel-string, they're much easier on the ears. Listening to a classroom full of cheepo steel-strings played by beginner middle school students is enough to make anyone lose it!

Also, in this price range I think the nylon-stringed instruments hold up better. Truss-rods to support the neck of a steel-string are just not great for a $60.00 guitar. After a few years they tend to bow in under the string tension. This makes them harder to play and intonation horrible.
I think that the 3/4 size is great for beginners of all ages because the students can easily see what they are doing without craning their necks over so much. And for middle school ages it's a must to have 3/4 size.

We're finishing up our second week of school and I'm very excited about what these kids are going to do this year. We've learned the one-string version of "Twinkle Twinkle", begun note reading, and are strumming "Every Rose Has It's Thorn" and "Amazing Grace" using Matt's famous EZ chords G, C and D. (More on that later)

What's this blog about?

I'm starting this blog to record my own experiences teaching groups of (sometimes young) individuals to play guitar. I've found that this is no easy task.

My background:

I'm 34 years old with a degree in Choral Music Ed. I've played the guitar for about twenty years, taught public school choral and general music for about ten years, and taught private guitar lessons for ten years as well. I've taught up to 60 students a week in music stores and at a church with a school of fine arts.

In that time I've found that guitar instruction books move too quickly, are set up in a way that makes no sense and are basically useful only to individuals with exceptional talent and/or prior musical experience. And that's for individual lessons! Try using these books in a classroom setting with average ability/interest level students and they are very ineffective.

In this blog I'll address some of these problems and their possible solutions with the hopes that others with experience will join in the discussion. In my searches I haven't found very many resources that are useful for a large class setting. Please let me know if you find something that you think works. Again, not for just highly motivated 'nerds' like I was when I started out but something that will work with your average student.