If you are new to teaching guitar to children in groups you will likely follow a familiar path. I have personally been teaching children for over 20 years but originally only taught one on one. My early belief was group teaching was less effective but the truth was I just did not know how to teach groups of children guitar. Here is how and what I learned.
My first experiences with group teaching were with adults. Adults are very easy to teach in groups because they listen without any need for rules. In other words they are all ears. There are some challenges of course but those challenges are mostly to do with guitar playing.
Here are the stages of learning to effectively group teach children guitar.
Stage 1. The awakening - I began by doing rock band work with younger kids in a group environment and quickly realised that with out some class rules there was going to be a lot of noise and very little constructive progress. I wanted the kids to enjoy themselves so in those early days I would just go with the flow. I soon realised that the kids who were serious were actually becoming frustrated by those kids who just wanted to mess around. The serious students soon dropped out and the others also dropped out soon after simply because they were not really serious about learning guitar.
Stage 2. Setting rules - I then did some research on what great teachers do to get results with groups of kids. The answer was rules. I did not want to have a lot of rules so I thought about what rules made the greatest impact. I broke it down to 3 rules in the end. 1. Fill in your practice log. All students must fill in their log each day. If you are not practicing there is no point. 2. In class if you have a question put your hand up. 3. Only play when and what I ask you to. These rules ensure students were learning and progressing.
Stage 3. Class strategies - I now had their attention so it was important I knew where I was going and what the objective was. I created the G4 GUITAR METHOD with Checklists so everyone was clear about the goal. I learned many years ago that the best lesson you can teach children is how to learn. Learning how to learn is more important that the content itself. In other words teaching them how to break tasks down into achievable steps with a clear goal in view is how they gain confidence. Many teachers get wrapped up in trying to come up with songs that will inspire their students from week to week but this is not a recommended strategy. Having a set program allows you to develop your teaching strategies each week because you learn how to get students over the same hurdles with greater ease. This builds confidence in both you and your students.
Levels of literacy and numeracy are reportedly poor in teens. You don’t need statistics to point out these facts - you need only spend a few hours with a group of teenagers to realise that they place importance on other things. Whilst able to design a perfect power point presentation with spectacular graphics, using a pre-packaged suite on a well-known platform, teens seem unable to find the time to check their work for such things as spelling, grammar and so on. The basics are most definitely dead. With so many people arguing that there is no longer a need for a person to be able to spell for themselves because of spell checkers and predictive text, it seems that teenagers continue in ignorant bliss as to the detrimental effects that texting is having on them and the long term effects of society. We are even breeding a generation of teachers who aren’t able to correct their pupils’ work because they often don’t know any different either.
The Result - Here is an example. A good routine is to begin every class with 5 mins of isolated picking. Start slow and even then lift the tempo in steps. By doing this students will want to practice picking each week so they get faster. Next pick a skill and do 10 minutes. E.g. Reading. Next do another skill or song. 3 minutes revise and answer question or have a little fun. Show off your own guitar skills. Leave them on high. Pumped and motivated. Last 2 minutes try and speak to a parent or two. While you are doing this usher your next group in and ask them to start with the picking. Don’t ever leave them just sitting there
Resource Author Francisco Rodriguez Higueras
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