What is the Best Approach to Teaching Guitar to Children:
This can mean many things to many people. The BEST thing for one student may not always be the best thing for the next one. Because the personalities of children and their reasons for learning guitar are so different and varied, so to must the approach be just as varied. Here are just a few of the many approaches to teaching guitar. Bear in mind, most teachers will only use ONE approach for ALL students.
The 1st position chord approach:
A beginner student learns 3 to 4 chords. Taught right off the bat, coupled with No fretboard note memorization. The student learns simple strumming patterns. Tunes and tab are the batting order. The current ability of the student dictates which variations on chords/strumming patterns, and keys. The use of a capo is avoids all bar chords. Difficult chords are left alone.
Pros: No sight-reading or notation needed, moving into playing songs can be faster, added lessons will be reinforcement of the 1st lesson. Many tunes only use 3 or 4 chords. Lots of repertoire built quickly.
Cons: HUGE difficulty spike. Teaching chords to a child student can be a huge obstacle to how long they stick to playing. When they first start playing, they have no finger strength at all. Fretting one single string and playing it cleanly and consistency is hard enough, now you, the teacher, expect the student to play multiples of that. A highly motivated student can push through “the wall”. It can be done! In most cases, an experienced teacher will know these difficulties already, and take other measures to avoid these problems.
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