lesson plans guitar.pdf

Fifty FlexibleLesson Plans

forTeaching guitar

Written and produced by Nick Minnion Cover design by John MinnionPublished by Teachguitar.com Copyright 2004 by Nick Minnion All rights reserved

CONTENTS

Note from the authorRhythm chart and tablature guide

Section 1 - Basics

1. Chord strumming for the beginner 2. Single note playing for the beginner3. Blues basics4. Left hand development5. Strumming patterns6. Consolidating 7. Preparation for barre chords8. Introducing other awkward chords9. Beginning theory10. Specific remedies for problems with basics

Section 2 - Beginning Improvising

11. Pre-scale training12. Starting blues scales13. How to practice blues scales14. Left hand technique15. Orientation16. Fluency17. Phrasing18. Creativity19. Functionality20. Specific remedies for problems with beginning improvising

Section 3 Beginning Blues

21. Shuffle patterns22. 12-bar blues patterns23. Chord-based blues riffs and licks24. Ninths, diminished and augmented chords in blues25. Key-based lead guitar26. Minor key blues27. Blues bass lines28. Integrating lead and rhythm29. Basics of slide guitar30. Specific remedies for problems with beginning blues

Section 4 Beginning Theory

31. Names of notes

32. The CAGED system33. Diagonal octave patterns34. The major scale35. Discovering key signatures36. Principal minor scales37. Harmonising the major scale38. Triad construction39. Harmonising minor scales40. Specific remedies for problems with beginning theory

Section 5 Beginning Jazz

41. Key-specific improvising42. Harmonising scales to produce four-note chords 43. Four-note major and minor arpeggios44. Basic jazz chord fingerings45. II-V-I chord exercises46. Modes47. II-V-I modal exercise48. Chord substitution basics49. Chord based improvisation50. Specific remedies for problems with beginning jazz

Author's notes

Welcome to Fifty Flexible Lesson Plans for teaching guitar!

This book is an attempt to answer the two questions uppermost in the new guitar tutor's mind:

What do I teach my students ? How do I do it ?

Each lesson plan includes a list of Objectives which aims to answer the 'What?' question. Then for each objective there is a list of Methods which aims to answer the 'How?' question.

How not to use this book

This is not a recipe book! There are good reasons why you are most unlikely to be able to take each lesson plan, simply follow it line by line and thereby produce a beautifully baked guitar player!

Firstly: This book is based on how I approach guitar playing and teaching. I am a plectrum-wielding blues guitarist who has learnt a little bit about other styles along the way. If you are a finger-picking folk guitarist or classical player for example, I expect you will find huge holes in my lists of objectives. I hope however that, having studied a few of my lesson plans, you will pick up enough of a feel of what is required, confidently to develop your own lesson plans with which to plug the gaps.

Secondly: I have tried to write these lesson plans to be applied to relatively slow learners. This is on the grounds that the same steps can be applied, or at least checked off, for the faster learners, simply at a faster rate. So, in writing these plans, I have held in mind the fact that they will need to be adapted by each tutor for each stu-dent they teach.

How to use this book

My advice is to start with the contents page and home in on any section of the book that takes your interest. It may be that just reading through a few objectives will, in itself, fuel you with enough ideas to meet the needs of a particular lesson.

Another approach is to effectively put yourself in the student's shoes and work through the lesson plans yourself line by line. I would certainly advise learning to play the exercises and sample pieces yourself before trying to teach them!

You may well find that you have to cycle through some of the objectives several times before they make sense to you. In other words, in preparing yourself to use these lesson plans, you are going to have to study them, not just read through them.

Tutors' level of musical knowledge and comprehension

The tutors using these plans will themselves vary enormously in their own level of musical experience and comprehension. Again, I have assumed a relatively low level of music theory knowledge and next to each question to be asked of your students I have included a suggested correct answer in brackets! It is envisaged that the first benefit of studying this set of lesson plans will be an increase in the tutor's own musical knowledge and comprehension.

Use of language

During the development of this book I have made several decisions about language. I am English, but most of my readers are from the USA. By way of compromise I have mainly stuck to American spellings (Harmonization, not Harmonisation for example), but have retained English musical terms like tone and semitone (instead of half step and whole step).

If in doubt about the meaning of any terms used in this book you may find it useful to check out these references:

On English/American language differences in musicDictionary.com

Study aids*

A number of features have been built into this book to help you study the lesson plans.

Annotated definitions: The first time a musical term or unusual English term is used in a lesson plan I have included a definition of the term accessible from the Annota-tions sidebar in Adobe Acrobat Reader. These words are highlighted in the text.

Cross-reference links: Reference is sometimes made in one lesson plan to another lesson plan which may occur earlier or later in the book: To help with navigation these references are highlighted in blue bold italics thus:

See Lesson plan 36

Clicking on this link takes you to the referenced lesson plan.

DefinitionHIGHLIGHTED: Highlighted words are defined in the Annotations panel in the sidebar. Alternatively you can access the definition by right-clicking on the highlighted word in the text, and then selecting open note.

Internet links: These are mainly links to articles or printable materials on the TeachGuitar.com web site. Again these are highlighted in blue bold italics:

Reference:Article: What to do when your student hasn't done their practice assignment

Providing you are online at the time, clicking on these links will open your default web browser and bring the web page in question to view. Return to the Lesson plan by closing or minimizing the browser window.

Rhythm chart and tab guide

Rhythm charts and tablature are used in some lesson plans to show examples of exer-cises and pieces of music. A guide to the symbols used can be found under Tab guide in the indexSupport

Any problems, queries or feedback please email me direct on [email protected]

Happy teaching!

Nick Minnion

RHYTHM CHART AND TABLATURE GUIDE

Rhythm charts in this book use the following symbols:

4/4 Four beats to the bar12/8 12 (triplet) beats to the bar| Bar lines|| End of section:|| Repeat from beginning||: :|| Repeat section between these marks./. Repeat previous bar

The following symbols are used in the tablature in this book:

--4/6-- Slide up from fret 4 to fret 6

--7\5-- Slide down from fret 7 to fret 5

--/9--- Slide up to fret 9 from a couple of frets below

--\2--- Slide down to fret 2 from a couple of frets above

--4b--- Slightly bend note at fret 4

-3b(4)- Bend note at fret 3 to make it sound as if played at fret 4

--2h4-- Hammer-on from fret 2 to fret 4

--6p5-- Pull-off from fret 6 to fret 5

--7~~-- Slight vibrato

--7~~~~ Sustained vibrato

--x---- Muted or missed note

Lesson plan 1:

CHORD STRUMMING FOR THE BEGINNER

Suitable for:Beginners with absolutely no previous experience. Beginners who appear particularly shy or nervous.

Prerequisites:None

General Objective:To get the student in contact with the instrument and with the subject of learning to play it. To get them started on basic rhythm guitar.

Summary of this lesson plan:A series of steps calculated to familiarize the student with the instrument and help them lose any apprehension they may have about their learning to play it. Introduction to chords and how they are used to accompany songs.

Stress:Relaxed, casual approach by tutor. Make it fun. Keep it light. Avoid too much discussion and explanation. Focus on getting student to DO.

Materials required:Diagram of String Names Diagram of First ChordsSong sheet

Special equipment required:None

Objectives and methods:

Objective 1. Student comfortable holding the guitar

Methods:

1. Tune the student's guitar2. Hand their guitar back to them3. Check that they are holding the guitar in a viable manner4. Ask them if they find the way they are holding the guitar comfortable5. Get them to try out different positions if appropriate

DefinitionVIABLE: Workable; practical.

DefinitionPOSITIONS: Guitar on right thigh or left thigh; neck angled up or horizontal; guitar pointing across students body or away from it.

Objective 2. Student orientated to strings and their related sounds

Methods:1. Ask them how many strings the guitar has2. Get them to play each string one at a time and to listen to the sound made3. Ask: 'Which string sounds the highest? Which string sounds the lowest?'4. Indicate on the string names diagram the top string and the bottom string

Objective 3. Student orientated to frets and related sounds

Methods:1. Point at frets and tell the student: 'These metal strips are called "frets"'2. Tell the student to press any string down against the 1st fret3. Get them to play the fretted string and listen to the sound it makes4. Get them to move up a fret on the same string, play and listen5. Ask them: 'Which sounds higher?'6. Continue the exercise until the student knows they can play higher or lower notes on any given string

Objective 4. Student orientated to string numbering

Methods: 1. Indicate diagram and tell student that the highest sounding string is called the 'top' string. 2. Ask them to guess what we call the lowest sounding one! 3. Explain that the strings are often referred to by numbers 1 - 6 4. Tell them the top string is the 1st string, the bottom one the 6th 5. Now get them to play strings at random as you call out the numbers 6. Continue this drill until the student's response time has markedly reduced

Objective 5. Student orientated to fret numbering

Methods: 1. Indicate diagram and tell student that the frets are numbered from 1 upward, starting at the nut. 2. Tell them to play the 6th string at the 3rd fret, 9th fret, 4th fret etc. 3. Continue at random until student's response time has markedly reduced. Objective 6. Student orientated to finger numbering and able to take instructions as to left hand placing.

Methods:1. Get student to hold out their left hand, fingers spread.2. Point to each of their fingers as you tell them: 'We'll call this the 1st finger, this the 2nd finger, this one the 3rd and this one the 4th finger okay?' 3. You say: 'Okay, lets see if we can put all this together now: hold down the

DefinitionRESPONSE TIME: How long the student takes to respond to, and successfully carry out, an instruction.

5th string at the 2nd fret with your 1st finger. Now, at the same time, the6th string with your 2nd finger. Good! Finally add the 3rd finger on the topstring at the 3rd fret.4. You say: 'Strum that and hear how it sounds'5. You say: 'Well done you have just played your first chord!'

Objective 7. Student able to memorize a chord

Methods:1. Get student to hold down the G chord as in previous objective2. Tell them to look at the pattern of the fingering on the chart and relate it to the shape their fingers are making on the fretboard3. Tell them in particular to note the position of the 1st finger4. Tell them to take the hand away and then find the shape again referring to the diagram only if necessary5. Repeat until student can find the chord, ideally without reference to the diagram

Objective 8. Student able to play a variety of chords

Methods:1. Decide on a song to best suit the student as their first song to learn2. Go through the procedures outlined in objectives 7 and 8 above with each of the chords in the song.3. Continue until the student can play each of the chords successfully (though not necessarily completely clean-sounding). They should be allowed to refer to the diagrams as needed at this stage.

Objective 9. Student's expectations of their own progress adjusted to line up with reality.

Methods:1. Listen to the results the student is achieving whilst carrying out the above objective. If the student is getting perfectly clean sounding chords then skip the rest of this step.2. Bring to the students attention any non-optimum sounds - buzzes, dead strings etc.. that they get on a specific chord.3. Show student that some of these problems can be cured by paying attention to correct positioning of the fingers (right behind the frets), correct pressure and correct angle of approach.4. Assure the student that many of these details will sort themselves out over time and that the more time spent playing and changing chords the sooner they will sound good.5. Convey to the student that, even if they do everything correctly, it may be some time before the chords sound perfect. They must allow for the hardening of the finger tips and the strengthening of the finger and wrist muscles to occur before this is realistically achievable.

6. Encourage the student to practice chords and chord changes on a 'little and often' basis during the early stages of their development.

Objective 10. Students ability to read a simple rhythm chart.

Methods:1. Indicate the part of the song sheet showing the rhythm chart .2. Point to the bar lines and define them.3. Point to the time signature and define it.4. Point to the chord symbols and relate them to the work the student has done thus far.5. Assure the student that, initially, you don't expect them to play in perfect time. (Because it is not physically possible to change chords fast enough before they have practiced a fair number of hours.)6. Get the student to play through the chart simply hitting four straight strums to the bar.7. Continue and/or repeat this step until the student is interpreting the chart confidently and correctly.

Objective 11. Student's agreement to focus on their ability to change chords.

Methods:1. Tell the student that there are three main areas of development in playing rhythm guitar: right hand movement, left hand precision (clean chords) and chord changing speed. 2.Demonstrate each of these to the student on your own guitar.3. Explain that if they focus on chord changing speed, the other two will more or less look after themselves.4. Get their agreement to make this their main practice focus.

Objective 12. Student's ability to practice chord changes effectively

Methods:1. Refer to rhythm chart of chosen song2. Ask student to work through the sequence as in objective 10, but strumming only once per bar (once per chord if more than one chord in a bar).3. Coach student on consistency of finger movement over changes. 1st-finger-first is probably the best rule to follow for most changes. The point is to get the student to figure out their own best way of changing and then stick to it.

Objective 14. Student's ability to play in time

Methods:1. Tell student to play through chosen song as per Objective 12 but explain that this time you are going to accompany them.2. Stress that all they are required to do is arrive at the first beat of each bar with the right chord. You are going to fill in the rest.

3. Do this real slow so that the student has every chance of achieving the objective.4. Talk to the student as you play thus:'Okay after 4 lets play G ......... 1... 2.... 3... 4.... Play! Now get ready with D. ..3... 4 and Hit It! Good! now A minor ... get ready and 3... 4... Hit it! ' etc....5. Continue the exercise, speeding up slowly if possible, but not so fast that the student can't keep up. The goal is to play in time, not to play to correct tempo.

References:

1. Article: Contact with the Subject 2. Article: The Virtuous Circles of Confidence Building 3. Article: Little and Often

Lesson plan 2:

SINGLE NOTE PLAYING FOR BEGINNERS

Suitable for:Beginners with absolutely no previous experience whatsoever. Beginners who appear particularly shy or nervous. Children. Senior students.

Prerequisites:Lesson Plan 1: Objectives 1-5 achieved.

General Objective:To get the student started on basic melodic/lead guitar and get them introduced to the way in which chords and riffs relate.

Summary of this lesson plan:In this lesson plan we lay the foundations of good single-note playing, ensuring that good fingering habits are developed from the outset. The student then takes the first steps in accompanying single note passages with easy chords.

Stress:Relaxed, casual approach by tutor. Make it fun. Keep it light. Avoid too much discussion and explanation. Focus on getting student to DO.

Materials required:Speed developer exerciseSingle-string boogie



Objective 1. Student applying the One finger per fret rule

Methods:1. Get the student to locate the 9th fret with the 1st finger2. Get them to align their 2nd, 3rd and 4th fingers with frets 10, 11 and 12 respectively.3. Demonstrate playing the notes C#, D, D# and E using one finger per fret4. Repeat as needed until student is confident they are following your instructions and you observe that they are doing so reasonably accurately (though don't expect clean sounds and nice rhythm just yet!).

DefinitionONE FINGER PER FRET: Positional playing. For example: If the 1st finger is playing notes at the 3rd fret, the 2nd finger looks after notes at the 4th fret, the 3rd finger at the 5th fret, the 4th finger at the 6th fret.

Objective 2. Student aware of methods of optimizing sound production

Methods:1. Demonstrate optimum approach to student. (Fingers perpendicular to fret board, contact with tips of fingers, not flats, fingers positioned just behind frets, pressure just enough to get a clean contact of string against fret, little finger powered by wrist muscles (its own muscles may not be strong enough at this stage).2. For each detail, check and coach accordingly.3. Repeat objective 1 above, demanding improved sound production from the student as a result of them attending to these details.4. Repeat until the student is happy that they are getting the best possible result at this stage (but explain that constant practice will help improve even more as fingers harden and muscle strength, coordination and neural control all improve.)

Objective 3. Student understanding speed-developer exercise

Methods:1. Indicate speed-developer exercise diagram to student2. Get them to work through the first part of the exercise, sticking just to the 6th string, concentrating only on correct sequence to begin with.3. Once they are confidently playing the first part correctly, coach them on playing it rhythmically and with best possible consistency of sound.4. Note that most beginners will play the notes staccato; demonstrate the difference between staccato and legato and coach them to play the exercise legato.5. Demonstrate how the exercise proceeds to the second part and is moved progressively down the fretboard.6. Ensure that the student understands they are expected to work through this exercise each time they pick up the guitar and that they should progress as far as they can, but not to the point of straining a muscle.

Objective 4. Student understanding how these basic principals are applied to playing single-note guitar passages.

Methods:1. Indicate single string boogie exercise to student2. Play through the exercise at moderate speed to give the student an idea of what they are aiming at achieving3. Bring the details of the fingering to the student's attention. Show them that you have lined up your left hand with the 1st finger playing notes on the 3rd fret, 2nd finger 4th fret and 3rd finger the 5th fret.

DefinitionSTACATTO: Cut short crisply, detached, separated from the next note.

DefinitionLEGATO: In a smooth, even style without any noticeable break between the notes.

Objective 5. Student able to interpret tablature

Methods:1. Indicate single string boogie exercise to student2. Ensure student can relate each line of the tablature to the appropriate string of the guitar.3. Ensure that the student understands that the numbers on the lines refer to fret numbers (not finger numbers).4. Point out that the tab has a time element moving from left to right (may seem obvious to you, but is not always obvious to complete beginners).5. Get student to play through the piece, at whatever pace they can, coaching only on correct sequence.6. Repeat as necessary until student is confident they are reading the sequence correctly.

Objective 6. Student playing a single-note passage accompanied by tutor

Methods:1. Tell student that you are now going to play the single string boogie exercise together.2. Tell them not to be too concerned about timing just yet as this will only come with practice. Tell them you will follow at their pace.3. Count the student in nice and slow and provide a light accompaniment following the suggested backing rhythm chart on the exercise sheet.4. Go through this a few times ideally until student is relaxed about playing it and having a bit of fun with it.

Objective 7. Student playing accompanying chords

Methods:1. Tell student that you are now going to reverse roles and that they are going to play the chords while you play the lead.2. Check them out on the chord diagrams for A7 D7 and E7 shown on the first chords diagram.3. Have them find each chord several times, both in sequence and at random until they know which is which and can find them without undue hesitation.4. Get them to strum through the 12-bar sequence one strum on each first beat of the bar. You strum with them, nice and lightly, filling in the other 3 beats while they prepare their changes.5. Have them play through it several times in this manner until a degree of connectedness is achieved.6. Finally, play the lead line over their chord changes, allowing them to dictate the rhythm and accepting that you may have to hold up your lead over some of their changes.7. Repeat until definite progress is achieved by the student.

Lesson plan 3:

BLUES BASICS

Suitable for:All students. Essential lesson for anyone interested in blues guitar, but I find this a useful route to take most students.

Prerequisites:Lesson Plans 1 and 2 completed.

General Objective:To get the student combining single-note and rhythm playing. To introduce the student to the blues scale and basic 12-bar blues chord sequence.

Summary of this lesson plan:In this lesson plan the student gets to apply the basics developed in the previous two lessons. They learn to play a one octave blues scale and then bring all this together to play a blues that incorporates both strumming and single-note technique.

Stress:This lesson is considerably more demanding of the student so a bit of expectation management may be required. Focus on each task separately and don't be in too much of a hurry to try to piece it all together until all the component parts are well within the student's control. As always: make it fun, keep it light, avoid too much discussion and explanation. Focus on getting student to DO.

Materials required:Speed developer exerciseSingle-string boogieFirst position blues scale in E Texas blues



Objective 1. Student prepared to move on and stretch their skills a significant step further.

Methods:1. Review the speed-developer exercise and ensure that student is progressing well with it. They should be able to work down the whole fretboard a step at a time with this exercise by now.2. Review single string boogie and check that student is comfortable playing it through in a way that is reasonably smooth and continuous.

DefinitionEXPECTATION MANAGEMENT: Student has unrealistic expectations about the nature of the task. You have to help them adjust their reality accordingly.

3. If either of these items are not yet up to scratch then time is better spent on coaching these than moving on just yet.4. If all appears well to you, ask the student if they are ready for the next step.5. If not, then backtrack and coach existing exercises in more detail, paying particular attention to areas that most concern the student.6. If student is ready, then move on to next objective.

Objective 2. Student able to play single octave blues scale in E (1st position)

Methods:1. Indicate diagram of blues scales and play through it carefully and slowly encouraging student to watch and listen to what you are doing.2. Get student to line up the fingers of their left hand, one finger per fret in the 1st position.3. Get them to play the scale slowly, reading it straight off the diagram if possible.4. Handle any problems or confusions with the student's interpretation of the diagram.5. Get the student to play the scale up and down until they have memorized it and are playing it reasonably smoothly.

Objective 3. Student able to play chords for Texas Blues exercise

Methods:1.Check student out on their interpretation of the chord diagrams for the E7, A7 (easy versions) and B7 chords.2. In particular, drill the change from B7 to A7 (suggest using fingers 2 and 3 for A7 as this makes the change easier).3. Indicate the sequence to the student and get them to play through it with you playing both parts, but them playing only the chords at this stage. This gives them plenty of time to change (until they come to the 10th bar anyway!).4. If changes are reasonable then coach them a little on getting an appropriate rhythm. (Make sure you have understood yourself, that the lead run starts on the 2nd beat of the bar!).

Objective 4. Student able to play lead runs for Texas Blues exercise

Methods:1. Return to the blues scale exercise from Objective 2. (above) and get student to run through it a couple more times.2. Now draw their attention to the tablature on the Texas Blues exercise and play the E riff through slowly so that they can relate the sound of it to the tab and to the scale they have just been playing.3. Show them that it is just the first 5 notes of the blues scale plus the first note repeated.4. Ask them to play it. Coach as necessary.5. Repeat steps 1-4 with each of the other two riffs, the A riff and B riff.

6. Have them play each riff through several times repeatedly until they are happy they've got it.

Objective 5. Student able to play the Texas Blues lead runs in sequence

Methods:1. Indicate sequence to student and tell them that you are going to play the whole piece through slowly and expect them to join you on the lead, but not yet on the chords.2. Play through taking care not to over stress the student by playing too fast. Perfect timekeeping is not relevant at this stage.3. Repeat several times until the student shows signs of definite progress.4. Once student is confident, then play only the chord parts in response to their playing the lead. Try to adjust your timing to theirs, no matter how slow.5. Repeat until student is happy they are doing ok.

Objective 6. Student able to integrate lead and rhythm parts of Texas Blues

Methods:1. Indicate the tab to your student and tell them that they are now going to play both lead and rhythm parts.2. Tell them just to go for it and not be too concerned about rhythm and timekeeping to begin with.3. Once they have got their bearings and are playing the sequence correctly, coach them on rhythm and timing. In particular, demonstrate how the riff starts on the 2nd beat of the bar.4. Get them to play it again aiming to get the timing right. Count them in from the second beat like this: ' 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and'.5. Continue until student is happy and has a sense of having achieved the end result to the best of their current ability.

Lesson plan 4:

LEFT HAND DEVELOPMENT

Suitable for:All students. Essential lesson for anyone struggling with chord changes.

Prerequisites:Lesson Plan 1 completed.

General Objective:To address difficulties with changing from chord shape to chord shape. To speed up this part of the learning curve.

Summary of this lesson plan:This lesson addresses the area of difficulty most commonly experienced by new beginners.

Stress:Encouragement and expectation management are an important part of this lesson. There is also a degree of getting the student to focus on problem areas and apply themselves in a disciplined manner.

Materials required:Song sheet(s)Beginner chords

Special equipment required:Metronome or drum machine (if available)Coloured pen


Objective 1. Student confident that they can strum in time and that their right hand action is not the problem.

Methods:1. Ask the student to mute their guitar by holding their left hand lightly against all six strings. Explain that for the purposes of this exercise we are going to treat the guitar purely as a percussion instrument. This enables us to concentrate on the actions of the right hand.2. Tell the student to accompany you while you play through a song the student is currently working on. All that is expected of the student is that they strum along on their muted guitar using any strumming pattern that keeps them in time with you.3. The only difficulty students have with this exercise stems from their having misunderstood what's expected of them. If the student is struggling to keep time

DefinitionEXPECTATION MANAGEMENT: Student has unrealistic expectations about the nature of the task. You have to help them adjust their reality accordingly.

get them to simplify their strumming pattern. This can be reduced right down to one downstroke per bar if necessary.4. Once the student is comfortably playing in time, continue for a verse or two then stop.5. Commend the student for their ability to keep good time.6. If the first song took quite a bit of coaching. Repeat with a different song. Keep it simple though.7. Complete this objective by drawing to the student's attention the fact that once their left hand is taken out of the equation, the right hand functions in perfect time and their strumming ability is at least adequate to play songs in time.

Objective 2. Student understanding that chord changes are the most important area to focus on at this stage

Methods:1. Get the student to play a variety of chords from the chord diagram sheet. This should include some that they have not played before.2. Indicate to the student that some of these chords sound better than others. Demonstrate why this is by showing how it is relatively easy to get a clean sound out of an E minor chord; less easy to get as good a result from B7, C, D or F.3. Point out to the student that although it is one of the goals of learning guitar to get a good clean sound out of every chord, it is not the best thing to focus on at this stage. 4. Summarize by saying that there are three separable skills that make up good basic rhythm playing: strumming action, left hand accuracy and chord-changing ability. The first of these skills is actually already in place to a reasonable degree (per Objective 1.(above)) and the second will have sorted itself out by the time they have finished working on the third.5. Make sure that the student has got the point that, to optimize their progress in this area, they should focus entirely on the changes.

Objective 3. Student familiar with 1st-finger-first principal and able to use it confi-dently

Methods:1. Take a copy of the beginners chords sheet and mark with a coloured pen the position of the 1st finger in each chord shape (except the A7 for which I generally recommend playing with 2nd and 3rd fingers only)2. Get the student to play each chord in turn, making a point of locating and holding down the 1st finger of each new chord, before adding the others.3. Once the student can do this easily, switch to picking out chords in random order.4. Choose an easy song or two and get the student to play through the chord sequence applying the '1st-finger-first principle'.5. Continue until student is happy with this idea and using it well.

Objective 4. Student aware of the technique of finding shortcuts between specific chords.

Methods:1. Take the change from G to Em as an example. Show student how both chords have the 1st finger on the 5th string at the 2nd fret.2. Get the student to practice changing from G to Em without their 1st finger leaving the fretboard (it has to slide along the string a bit).3. Once they're happy with that, show them how they can then change from Em to C without moving the 2nd finger.4. Get them to examine the following changes to see if they can work out similar shortcuts in the fingering: C - D7, D - Dm, Em - A7, E - E7.5. Take the change from B7 to A7 as an example. Show student how this can be achieved by hopping the 2nd and 3rd finger part of the B7 shape across to the next strings down (from strings 5 and 3 across to strings 4 and 2). 6. Using A7 to Dm show how the change can be made easier by sliding the 3rd finger up a fret and then adding the 1st and 2nd fingers to form the rest of the Dm shape.7. Look at other changes and explore systematic ways of linking the chords. If possible get the student to find their own methods. It's all about getting them to use commonsense and making them aware of the possibilities.8. Point out that this approach is useful at all levels of development. For example every time I discover a new jazz chord, I apply this method to find the easiest way of fingering it.

Objective 5. Student aware of the hand rotation technique and happy to use it.

Methods:1. Take the chords G7 and A major as good examples to demonstrate to the student how the whole hand position has to rotate through about 90 degrees when you make a change like this.2. As an experiment, ask the student to hold down G7, and then without moving anything but their fingers, change to A major. Have a good laugh with them about how difficult that is.3. Demonstrate to the student that each chord belongs to a set of shapes all having a similar angle of rotation. For example, no wrist or arm movement is required to get easily from C to Am, so we say they have the same rotational angle.4. Another way of demonstrating this is to look at the chord G Maj7 fingered as follows:

E e======||||||------|1|||3------2|||||

And compare it to the same chord, but fingered like this:E e======||||||------|2|||1------3|||||

These give you a good example of completely opposite rotation.5. Get the student to play several different chords and to feel how his hand naturally wants to rotate in a particular way for each chord. The trick is to allow the rotation by keeping a relaxed, flexible wrist, elbow and shoulder. 6. Now take the E - B7 change as a good example and get the student to deliberately make a point of rotating their hand position from one chord to the other. This should make the chord change quicker and much less physically stressful.

Objective 6. Student aware of other physical factors affecting chord changing ability

Methods:1. Bring to the student's attention the range of factors affecting chord changing. These may include: Thumb position, wrist action, elbow action, shoulder action, angle that the guitar is held at (in all three planes!), sitting posture etc..2. Stress that the important thing is to find the approach that best suits the individual student - hand sizes, strength and suppleness vary enormously from person to person so no hard and fast rules can be applied. A little physical experimentation should be encouraged.3. Select a particular change the student has difficulty with and get them to experiment with it according to all the above points and to see if they can find the best possible approach to that change for them.4. Continue with this all the time your student is making useful discoveries. Then underline the fact that continued regular practice will sort the rest out in time as their finger tips harden, muscles strengthen and coordination improves.

Objective 7. Student getting used to 'riding over' problems with chord changes

Methods:1. Choose a song or simple four chord sequence (G Em C D7 for example) that contains changes that should not present too much of a problem to the student.2. Explain that you are going to play the sequence together at a nice easy tempo to start with.3. Explain that you expect the student to get some of the chords wrong, the changes badly timed etc.. (because, if they don't make mistakes, you are going to gradually increase the tempo until they do!)4. The idea is for them to learn to carry on playing through the errors.

5. Have a go at this exercise and observe how student progresses. Make sure you pace it right so that they do make some errors, but not so many as to seize up.completely.6. Coach them one at a time on these points: - Arriving on time for the first beat of each bar no matter what happens in the other three.- Observe faults as they occur, but don't attempt to correct until next time round (it's usually too late by the time they have figured out why it sounds wrong)- Stay relaxed and not get frustrated with themselves.- Keep smiling so that the audience doesn't realize that the nasty noises are coming from them.7. Once the student is happy doing this exercise with you, try the same thing but against a metronome or drum machine pattern. This is harder because you won't be covering their mistakes.8. Gradually increase the tempo of the metronome or drum machine to keep the student stretching.

Lesson plan 5:

STRUMMING PATTERNS

Suitable for:All students.


General Objective:To enable the student to play simple strumming patterns to suit a variety of songs

Summary of this lesson plan:Once the student's left hand is able to change from chord to chord quick enough to enable continuity it is worth spending a little time on developing basic right hand technique.

Stress:This lesson may well need to be expanded to suit the particular style of music you teach, but I have tried to isolate the underlying basics of all strumming styles.Build your student's confidence step by step and above all allow them plenty of time to work out each stage for themselves and reach a point where they are relaxed and confident that they can do it.

Materials required:Basic strumming pattern diagrams

Special equipment required:Metronome or drum machine (if available)


Objective 1. Student familiarized with strum pattern charts and able to interpret them.

Methods:1. Ask the student to look at the first strum pattern chart and explain that they work in a way similar to tablature. The six strings are represented by the horizontal lines.2. Point out how the charts are divided up into repeated two-bar sections.3. Indicate that the arrows represent each strum and have three attributes: length of strum (how many strings it covers), direction (up arrows represent down strokes!) and accent (bold strokes are accented).4. Handle any queries or confusions about this before proceeding further.

Objective 2. Student able to play muted rhythm guitar

Methods:1. Explain to the student that for a lot of this work you are going to ask them to play muted guitar.2. Demonstrate this by playing a few bars of muted guitar yourself and explain that the purpose of this is to allow the student to concentrate solely on their right hand action without having to worry about chords and chord changes for the time being.3. Get the student to mute their guitar with their left hand. Emphasize that this is done by allowing the hand to touch, but not press down on the strings. It is important that the strings don't contact the frets at all. 4. Get them to play using any strum pattern they like until they get used to the idea of playing muted guitar.

Objective 3. Student able to play through the strum pattern sheet with muted guitar

Methods:1. Get the student to work on each pattern one at a time. For each pattern, make a point of slowing down and first concentrating only on correct sequence of actions.2. Once sequence is correct, coach on timing.3. Once timing is correct, coach on finer points like smoothness, plectrum control (if appropriate), relaxation, lightness of touch - coach all these points, but always one at a time!4. Once student is happy with a pattern and you have got some significant progress from them, move on to next pattern and repeat these steps.5. Continue through the sheet (which is designed to get progressively harder) until you reach a point where the student begins to experience difficulty.6. Work through this point to a good result and then stop. Save the rest for a later lesson.

Objective 4. Student able to find appropriate strum pattern with which to accompany various songs

Methods:1. Explain to the student that they are going to continue working with muted guitar.2. Choose a song that has a nice plain rhythm to it.3. Ask the student to accompany you, treating their guitar purely as a percussion instrument.4. Initially, suggest an appropriate strumming pattern to them for each song.5. Play through the song and check that student is strumming in time and is comfortable with what they are doing.6. Repeat with other songs, being certain to avoid anything too demanding at this stage.7. As student gains in confidence, have them find their own appropriate strum patterns.

8. Continue exercise until student is confident and happy that they can work the right hand end of the guitar okay.

Objective 5. Student able to strum along over chord changes.

Methods:1. Select the easiest strum pattern.2. Select an easy chord change with which the student is already familiar (G to Em is a good example).3. Have the student play the pattern over this change until they can do it repeatedly without any dropped beats.4. Select a slightly harder pattern and repeat over the same change.5. Continue working through different patterns, gradually getting harder.6. Once student is sailing along nicely, pick a slightly harder chord change and work in a similar way with that.7. Continue the exercise until you find a level that presents difficulty to the student.8. Coach the student through that level thoroughly until they know they can do it.9. End the exercise at that point.

Objective 6. Student able to strum their way through a whole song

Methods:1. Select a song with a nice easy strum pattern and easy chord changes.2. Select a slow tempo on the metronome or drum machine.3. Have the student strum through the song with you accompanying them playing an identical pattern.4. Once they appear to be ok with it, back-off on the volume of your own accompaniment so that you can clearly hear whether the student is up to speed.5. If all is going well crank up the tempo by 5 b.p.m. and repeat.6. Work towards a realistic tempo for that particular song and, once achieved, let the student play it without you accompanying them.7. Coach them on any aspect of this that can be improved, but be sure to pick only one aspect at a time.8. Select a harder song and repeat from step 2.

Lesson plan 6:

CONSOLIDATION


Prerequisites:Lesson Plans 1,2,4&5 completed.

General Objective:To get the student to put into use all the skills covered thus far. To develop confidence, and a degree of independence in the student.

Summary of this lesson plan:This is a blueprint for what should be a number of lessons designed to help the student thoroughly assimilate all they have learnt so far.

Stress:The emphasis here is on supporting the student as necessary, but gradually reducing that support as the student develops their own sense of responsibility for their playing.We are not looking for dramatic breakthroughs with these lessons (though they may occur), we are looking to firm up the student's knowledge and confidence in applying it.

Materials required:Song sheet(s)1st position chord sheetConventional songbook

Special equipment required:Metronome or drum machine (if available)


Objective 1. Student confident that they can play a song they have already learnt from beginning to end with you accompanying them on rhythm guitar.

Methods:1. Choose, or get the student to choose the song they find the easiest to play.2. Ensure that you have the whole song mapped out - intro, verse, chorus, middle eight, ending, outro - the whole works.3. If at all possible sing the song (you don't have to be a great singer).4. Make your accompaniment strong to begin with to support the student, but as the song progresses, back off a little to allow them to take more rhythmic responsibility for the song.

DefinitionRHYTHMIC RESPONSIBILITY: Playing in a way which dictates the tempo.

5. After one run through, review the song and coach the student through any bottlenecks.6. Tell student you are going to go through the song one more time, but this time you expect them to take more rhythmic responsibility for the song. 7. Play through the song keeping your rhythm playing quite light to allow the student to take charge.

Objective 2. Student confident that they can play a song they have already learnt from beginning to end with you accompanying them on lead, bass, percussion and/or vocals.

Methods:1. Choose, or get the student to choose another song they find easy to play.2. Ensure that you have the whole song mapped out - intro, verse, chorus, middle eight, ending, outro etc..3. Get the student to play through the song with you accompanying them either on lead guitar, bass, percussion and/or vocals.4. After one run through, review the song and coach student over any bottlenecks or passages they are uncertain about.5. Encourage the student to relax and generally free up their playing and stress that this type of lesson should be the most fun because you are closest to working with an 'end result' of all their (and your) hard work!6. Play through the song again as many times as feels appropriate with this attitude in mind.

Objective 3. Student having a sense of 'completing' their learning of a song

Methods:1. Choose, or get the student to choose a song they already know how to play, but have not yet committed to memory.2. Ask them to play the first line of the song from the song sheet.3. Get them to read out loud the names of the chords in the first line.4. Now hide the song sheet and get them to play the first line without looking.5. Repeat 2-4 until they are doing it right and with a high degree of certainty.6. Now repeat 2-4 with lines 1 and 2.7. Same with lines 1,2&3.8. Continue in this manner until you have worked through the whole song.9. Once they have the song memorized play through it several times using the methods described in objectives 1 and 2 above.10. Repeat with other songs as appropriate.11. Encourage student to practice these songs like this from now on. (Sometimes I tear up the song sheet to make this point!)

NB. Whenever you do an exercise like this always work with songs written out four bars to the line. Nearly all songs make more sense when written out like this and repeated patterns of similar chord changes show up.

DefinitionBOTTLENECKS: Parts of the song that prove difficult and slow the student down.

Objective 4. Student playing a new song 'straight off the page'

Methods:1. Choose, a song that the student hasn't played before. It must be easy to play for the student and contain no chords that are new to them.2. Get the student to look at the song sheet. Make sure they understand the time signature and give them some idea of the feel of the song rhythmically.3. Get them to look through the song sheet and note how parts of the chord sequence might repeat. Also get them to spot any similarities the song may have with other songs they have already learnt.4. Play a verse or two of the song, singing it if possible, just to give them a rough idea of how it goes.5. Tell them they are now going to have a go at playing it 'straight off the paper'.6. Count them in and play with them, minimizing your playing to provide only as much support as needed.7. Repeat with a couple more similar songs until student is confident that they can do this, preferably without help from you.

Objective 5. Student comfortable with reading from songbooks and no longer mystified by the conventional notation used in them.

Methods:1. Choose an appropriate page from a songbook. Make sure it is a song written in 4/4 time. Ideally the song book should show chord symbols, lyrics and melody line in standard notation.2. Help the student de-mystify the written music by pointing out elements that they are already familiar with (bar lines, time signature, repeat marks etc..)3. Point out where the chord symbols are and how they line up with the timing of the melody and lyrics.4. Point out a crotchet to them and indicate that that type of note is worth one beat.5. Explain how, in 4/4 time, the value of notes and rests in each bar should add up to 4.6. Using this knowledge, point to various bars and get them to figure out what other note types are worth. For example if you have a bar with two crotchets and a minim in it should be easy enough to figure out that the minim is worth 2 beats. In a bar with three crotchets and two quavers the student should be able to calculate that quavers are worth 1/2 a beat each etc....7. Finally show them how the notes occupy different positions on the stave and explain that this is what determines their pitch. Note that at this stage you are not teaching them to read music so much as just taking some of the mystery out of the subject.8. Make the point, to the student, that with just these few items cleared up they can at least follow the shape of the melody and figure out exactly how it corresponds with chord changes etc.. That is usually sufficient to enable a student to learn songs from books.

9. Handle any queries the student has about this, but try to avoid going in too deep. Another lesson can be spent going over the basics of how to read standard notation.

Objective 6. Student able to work out familiar songs from songbooks.

Methods:1. Choose a song from the songbook that the student already knows by ear. If the student doesn't know any of the songs from the book, then find a nice easy song and play and sing it to them.2. Have them look through the song first and coach them on their interpretation of how the song is written out.3. Check that they are familiar with all the chords used in the song.4. Have them play the song straight off the page. 5. If the student has difficulty and keeps losing track of where they are in the song (usually caused by their need to keep looking at their left hand) help out by following the students progress using your plectrum or finger tip to point to the appropriate bar.6. Coach the student through any parts they are struggling with.7. Choose another song and repeat.8. Continue until student is confident that they can work with the information given in songbooks.

Objective 7. Student comfortable with interpreting tablature as found on the internet.Methods:

1.Download and print off some appropriate tabs to suit the level and musical interests of your student.2. Talk through how the strings and fret numbers are represented on the tab and ensure that the student is oriented correctly to which way is up, down and along etc..3. With a blank sheet of paper cover up all but the first phrase on the tab.4. Get your student to figure out this phrase and play it in their own time.5. Get them to repeat the phrase several times through until they have definitely got it with confidence.6. Slide the blank paper along to reveal the next phrase.7. Once they have figured this phrase out, get them to join the two phrases until they can play them fluidly.8. Repeat this process with each phrase until the whole piece is worked through.9. Repeat with other tabs until student is confident that they can learn new songs this way.

Objective 7. Student's confidence in being able to find simple chord sequences by ear.

Methods:1. Choose a song in 4/4 time that uses only three chords. These three chords should be I IV and V in the same key (e.g.: G C and D or A D and E) the V chord may be a V7 (D7 or E7 in our examples).2. Talk to the student about the function of these three chords.3. Play the song without the student being able to see what you are doing and get the student to listen carefully, first to the timing of the song.4. Ask them what time signature they think the song is in.5. If they can't work this out then coach them by getting them to clap, or strum muted guitar along to the song until they have some insight into how to work out the timing.6. Provide the student with blank paper and pen. Play through the first verse or chorus and get them to outline their own rhythm chart for the song by writing bar lines, 4 bars for each line. This way they can map out the correct length of the verse and or chorus. Check their efforts and coach if necessary.7. Play through the first part again and get them to note down exactly where chord changes occur. They can mark this with a small 'x' on the rhythm chart. They are not trying to say what the changes are, just listening for where the changes occur.8. Check and coach if needed.9. Play through the part once more and get them to fill in the key chord (chord I) wherever it appears.10. Check and coach as required.11. Play through once more and get them to fill in the V or V7 chord wherever it appears.12. Check and coach as needed.13. Play through a final time and get them to fill in the IV chord.14. Now get them to play the whole section through with you accompanying them very lightly so that they can hear that they have got it right.15. Repeat steps 6-14 with the remaining part(s) of the song.16. Repeat with other songs as appropriate sticking to songs with 4/4 time signaturess and I IV V chords until the student has a high level of confidence that they can do this.17. At a later stage this objective can be repeated using songs with more complex time signatures and gradually introducing other chords.

Lesson plan 7:

PLAYING BARRE CHORDS

Suitable for:Teenage and adult students. Not recommended for children. Use discretion with senior students.

Prerequisites:Lesson plans 6 and 42 completed.

General Objective:To introduce the student to the concept of barre chords and to begin the process of physically preparing them to play barre chords. To enable them to name the six most commonly used barre chord shapes.

Summary of this lesson plan:In this lesson we first show the student an exercise that will enable them to strengthen the required muscles ready to play barre chords in a few weeks time. We go on to get the student to understand barre chords and learn how to name them.

Stress:This is mainly about preparing the student. Don't rush the student into playing barre chords, because there is a real risk of putting them off the whole subject of guitar playing if you do this. Part of this lesson is about selling the idea of the value of learning barre chords to the student. The student is going to be asked to invest a considerable amount of effort and persistence into acquiring the ability to play barre chords. They simply won't do this unless they have some idea of the value of the outcome and how it affects their ability to play a much wider range of material.

Materials required:

Chromatic scale derivationBarre chord diagrams



Objective 1. Student introduced to the concept of barre chords

Methods:1. Tell the student that you are going to introduce a more advanced way of playing guitar to them in this lesson.2. Tell them you are going to prepare them to learn to play barre chords.

3. Demonstrate briefly what a barre chord is by playing a few snippets of songs that particularly benefit from using barre chords (Sitting on the Dock of the Bay is a great example).4. Demonstrate how barre chords enable full control of all six strings and show how this enables you to play rock, funk, blues, reggae rhythms etc.. more convincingly than with open chords alone. A lot of this is down to good left-hand muting skills of course, but you needn't go into detail on that aspect in this lesson.5. Briefly demonstrate how barre chords enable you to play a whole lot of chords (many of which simply can't be played as open chords) with just one shape. Make the point that, once mastered, barre chords enable the guitarist to be far more versatile in all respects.6. Warn the student that like most powerful tools, getting used to using barre chords takes more time and practice than anything else they have learnt on the instrument so far and explain that you don't expect a result over night and nor should they.7. Emphasize that today you are just going to set the process in motion.

Objective 2. Student understanding of the nature of the physical task involved

Methods:1. Show the student how barre chords involve you fretting all six strings with the index finger.2. Point out that, because the finger has to be held straight, whilst still applying pressure to the strings, an unusually high workload is imposed on the muscles connected to the 1st finger.3. Explain that, before the student can be expected to use their finger in this way without risk of muscle strain, a few weeks worth of regular finger-strengthening exercises must be carried out.4. Show them the exercise which is simply to barre the guitar at the 12th fret and hold the barre down whilst playing slowly up and down the strings thus: E A D G B e B G D A E. This should take between 6 and 8 seconds. The finger should then be relaxed and slid down a fret. The finger is then clamped back on the strings and the strings played in order as before. 5. The exercise should be continued unhurriedly, moving down a fret at a time until the 1st fret is reached.6. Tell the student that when they do this exercise they should be listening to the sound and noting whether it is clean or not, but not making any great effort to get it clean. Doing the exercise, on a 'little and often' basis, will itself ensure improvement in this respect.7. Tell the student that they should carry out this exercise slowly and should on no account proceed past the point where they feel cramp-like pains developing. 8. Get the student to have a go at the exercise and coach them on doing it with precision. It is particularly important not to hurry it, as this does not allow the muscles to load up sufficiently to benefit from the exercise.

9. Once you are sure that the student has fully understood what they need to do, encourage them to do this exercise as often as possible over the next few weeks and assure them that this will remove a lot of the pain and frustration from learning barre chords.

N.B. If your student has less than a year of guitar playing experience you are well advised to complete this lesson plan two or three weeks later after checking that they have made good progress with objective 2.

Objective 3. Student understanding the subject of barre chords in general

Methods:1. Ask the student to play as open chords the five chords C, A, G, E and D. Check that they play them correctly.2. Tell the student that, these are the five basic chord shapes, upon which practically all other chord shapes are based.3. Demonstrate this to the student by showing them examples of how these shapes are used to make other chords: Examples of this include the open F chord (made from the 'E' shape, the Bb chord made from the 'A' shape and the B7 chord (made by sliding the C7 shape down a fret).4. Explain that any one of these five shapes can, in theory, be played with a barre behind it anywhere on the fretboard to produce another 11 chords. 5. Demonstrate how this is done, but underline the fact that some of the shapes are physically extremely difficult to use in this way. (A barred 'G' shape at the 1st fret to make G# is a good example of 'extremely difficult!).6. Conclude by pointing out that in 99% of cases guitarists generally settle on using either 'E' or 'A' shapes as barre chords as they are physically the easiest to finger.

Objective 4. Student knowing the six basic barre chord shapes

Methods:1. Ask the student to play as open chords the three chords E, Em and E72. Clarify that there are two common fingerings for E7 and see that the student knows both of them.3. Ask the student to play as open chords the three chords A, Am and A74. Clarify that there are two common fingerings for E7 and see that the student knows both of them.5. Demonstrate to the student how these are all played as barre chords. 6. Underline the fact that the chord type is determined by the shape made by the 2nd, 3rd and 4th fingers.7. Show how the root note of 'E' shaped barre chords is always found on the 'E' string, where the barring finger holds it down. Similarly, the root note of 'A' shaped barre chords is always found on the 'A' string, where the barring finger holds it down.

DefinitionROOT NOTE: The name of the note on which the chord is built. The root note of E minor is E. The root note of Eb minor is Eb, the root note of F#min7b9#13sus is F#.

8. Now get the student to have a go at playing barre chords at random.9. Once student is showing signs of progress overcoming the physical exertions required by this, ask them to play specific chords with specific shapes: B7 using an 'E' shape, Fm using an 'A' shape, G# using an 'E' shape etc...10. Continue with this for as long as necessary, coaching where required.

References1. Article: Don't believe a word your student says!2. Article: Examine Revise and Consolidate

Lesson plan 8:

INTRODUCING OTHER AWKWARD CHORDS



General Objective:To introduce to the student some of the more difficult chord shapes and also the concept of moving shapes up the neck.

Summary of this lesson plan:Tackling the dreaded F chord and other chords requiring four fingers. Using these chords as movable shapes.

Stress:Pay due respect to the physical aspect of this lesson. Apply the 'little and often' principle both to the lesson and when briefing the student on how to practice. Expectation management - let the student know that getting these chords to sound good usually takes at least a few weeks of consistent practice.

Materials required:

1st position chordsC7 BluesSong sheets



Objective 1. Student happy playing a four-fingered chord (B7)

Methods:1. Get the student to look at the diagram for B7 and hold the chord down.2. Get them to remove their hand from the fretboard and then find the chord shape again. Repeat this many times.3. Get them to find the shape purely by feel, without looking at their left hand at all.4. Get them to take their hand off the fretboard and find the chord again without looking. Repeat this many times.5. Get them to play E B7 over and over again.6. Get them to play A B7 over and over again.

7. Pick a song with these chords (I use Sloop John B as recorded by the Beach Boys) and get the student to play through it.8. Encourage them to practice the song at home.

Objective 2. Student happy playing a movable four-fingered chord shape

Methods:1. Get the student to look at the diagram for C7 and hold the chord down.2. Get them to remove their hand from the fretboard and then find the chord shape again. Repeat many times.3. Get them to either miss or mute the top and bottom E strings whilst playing C7.4. Get them to look at the diagram for G7 and practice that until they are happy playing it.5. Check them out on D7 similarly6. Write out a 12-bar blues in G using these chords7. Get them to play through the 12 bar so that they are getting used to using these chords in a typical setting. Accompany them with a bit of blues lead or a nice funky bass line or something because 1st position chords used in blues sound a bit weak without accompaniment.8. Continue to work with this until student is comfortable with the chords.9. Encourage them to practice these chords at home.

Objective 3. Student introduced to the F chord

Methods:1. Get the student to look at the diagram for F (Open F, not the barre chord) and hold the chord down. Make a decision whether to teach them the three or four fingered version (open A on the 5th string or fingered C).2. Get them to remove their hand from the fretboard and then find the chord shape again. Repeat several times.3. Try out various approaches to see if the student can find one that gets a clean sound out of all five strings (the 6th string should not be included in this chord). Approaches include using the edges of their fingers instead of tips to hold the strings down, putting the fingers on in reverse order (3rd finger first, playing a C chord and 'folding it over' ...etc.. Different things work best for different people so be experimental.4. Reassure the student that no matter how hard it seems at first the F chord will eventually sort itself out. The most important thing is not to avoid using F chords just because they sound a bit naff to start with.5. Pick a song that uses F (I use House of the Rising Sun in Am or Knights in White Satin in Em). Bob Dylan songs like All along the watchtower in Am or Like a Rolling Stone in C are really good as well.6. Get them to play through the song coaching them just to go for it with the F chords and not be put off by the less than brilliant sound they are likely to get at first.7. It's worth pointing out that F can't really be avoided as it is used very commonly.

Objective 4. Student introduced to the idea of moving chord shapes up the neck

Methods:1. Get the student to play C7.2. Play it yourself and move the shape up the neck playing C#7, D7,D#7 etc.3. Show the student how you are either missing or muting the top and bottom strings, although these can be let ring in some positions (eg. rooted at 7th fret the shape makes a perfect 6-string E7, at the 12th fret an A7, at the 9th fret a perfect F#7 ), the chord is otherwise to be considered a four-string chord.4. Get them to have a go at this.5. Coach them towards trying to hold the chord shape intact as they move it. (I use the concept of sliding the fretboard through their hand rather than sliding their hand along the fretboard.)6. Spend several more minutes on this.7. Next explain the concept of root note8. Point out that the root note in this shape is on the 5th string.9. Get them to locate the notes C, F and G on the 5th string10. Get them to move the C7 shape so that they are rooted on C, F and G respectively and explain that this is one way of playing the sequence C7 F7 G7.11. Show them the C7 blues printout.12. Get them to strum through the chord sequence at their own pace to get used to the idea of changing chords like this up and down the neck.13. Play the tabbed lead part over the top of their strumming.14. If appropriate swap roles and coach them through learning the tabbed lead part. If they are only just making it on strumming the movable C7 shapes then leave this until they have practiced a bit more.15. Encourage them to practice this at home.

Objective 5. Student integrating some of these new chords in a song

Methods:1. Find a song that uses F and C7. (John Lennon's Ballad of John andYoko is a fine example).2. Get your student to play through the song to the best of their ability stressing the need to accommodate late changing and poor sound quality on the new chords.3. Play through the song a number of times giving your student a reasonable amount of support on rhythm guitar.

Objective 6. Student using the F shape as a movable chord

Methods:1. Write out a 12-bar blues in the key of F using all major chords. (F Bb and C)2. Show the student how they can play these chords using a movable F shape.3. Although strictly speaking the chord is rooted on the 4th string most people find it easier to work it out from the top string root note.

DefinitionROOT NOTE: The name of the note on which the chord is built. The root note of E minor is E. The root note of Eb minor is Eb, the root note of F#min7b9#13sus is F#.

4. Get them to have a go at this, but point out that this is physically likely to be the hardest part of this whole lesson plan. 5. Encourage them to have a crack at this from time to time because it is a great way to improve on the sound of their basic F chord and it also helps map out territory for more advanced ways of playing guitar later (Chuck Berry style Rock 'n' Roll for example).6. Once they are cool with just strumming movable 'F' shapes you can build on this by getting them to add the 6th note in a shuffle pattern style.

Lesson plan 9:

FOUNDATIONS OF MUSIC THEORY



General Objective:To lay the foundations on which a student's comprehension of guitar music theory will be based.

Summary of this lesson plan:Learning names of notes and how to find them on the guitar. Understanding the definitions of basic terms.

Stress:As with all theory work, avoid over explaining. Get the student to discover by doing. Check for real comprehension at every step. Get student to put theory to immediate use. In this way you avoid having to teach and re-teach the same points over again.Beware of going in too deep too fast.

Materials required:

Special equipment required:Piano or keyboard, or if neither is available a life size diagram of keyboard layout.


Objective 1. Student familiarized with note names on open strings

Methods:1. Check with the student to see if they know the names of the notes on the open strings. If they say they do test them on it.2. If they are not conversant with open string note names then teach them a mnemonic like: Elephants And Donkeys Grow Big Ears. Then test them on it.3. Continue to test in both directions. That is to say: play a string open and ask the student to name it. Then name a string and ask the student to play it. Continue in this manner until student can do this with ease.4. Check that the student knows alternative descriptions for the strings (1st, 2nd , 3rd string etc.. and top and bottom). Test this knowledge in a similar manner.5. Finally mix questions like this: What note will we hear if I play the 3rd string?Which number string is tuned to B? Which two strings have the same note name? and so on.

Objective 2. Student understanding how natural notes are named on the piano

Methods:1. Explain that the guitar fretboard is arranged according to the chromatic scale.2. Define chromatic scale.3. Underline to the student that it is of vital importance to learn the notes on this scale and because of that, you are going to go over it in some detail.4. Tell the student that the chromatic scale is best understood by reference to the keyboard or piano.5. Using a keyboard, piano or diagram of a keyboard, ask the student to notice the layout of white and black keys on the keyboard.6. Keep prompting the student with questions until they include in their answer the observation that the black keys are grouped in twos and threes.7. Ask them if they know why this is.8. If they are not sure, then demonstrate (with as much participation from the student as possible), how the pattern of notes provides a method of uniquely identifying each note. Point out that the white note C always comes just before the group of two black notes, the D note always between the two black notes, the E note just after the two black notes ... and so on.9. Once the student has thoroughly got this idea get them to play white notes selected at random across the whole range of the keyboard. (This often has quite an effect on the student - typically they've been mystified for years by the layout of keys on a piano and are amazed to find understanding it so easy!)

Objective 3. Student understanding the terms sharp (#) and flat (b) and able to name black notes on the keyboard

Methods:1. Ask the student if they know what the adjective sharp (#) means in music. The definition you want is: Sharp means 'Higher'. The student may well give you a more complex definition, but at this stage we want to keep things real basic. So sharp means 'Higher'.2. Deal similarly with the definition of Flat (b) as meaning 'Lower'.3. Tell the student that, if they ever get confused between these two (and people very often do), to think of walking into a room barefoot and treading on a SHARP thumbtack! This makes you leap UP in the air, doesn't it?! Now you go and put on your biggest pair of boots and come back in and stamp DOWN on the tack and FLATTEN it. Silly? Maybe, but little memory aids like this work really well and help save so much confusion later.4. Point to the note C# on the keyboard as you tell the student that this black note can be viewed as either C# when you look 'up' at it from the note C, or Db when you look 'down' at it from the note D. 5. Repeat this with G#/Ab.6. Ask the student to name other black notes giving you both sharp and flat names each time.7. Continue with this until the student is totally confident they can now name any note on the piano.

DefinitionCHROMATIC SCALE: The scale of all 12 notes.

8. Test them by picking black or white notes at random.

Objective 4. Student understanding how the notes on the chromatic scale are named

Methods:1. Get the student to play all the notes (black and white) on the keyboard starting at E and ascending one note at a time until they have completed an octave.2. Coach them as necessary until they are doing this fine.3. Now get them to do it backwards descending from a high E down one note at a time until they reach the E an octave lower.4. Once they are happy playing this scale up and down, ask them to name the notes out loud as they play them, using sharp names for black notes on the way up and flat names on the way down. You should hear them say: 'E F F# G G# A A# B C C# D D# E Eb D Db C B Bb A Ab G Gb F E'.5. Drill and coach this until it is really smooth and the student is certain of their ability to do it.

Objective 5. Student able to name notes on the guitarMethods:

1. Remind the student that the guitar fretboard is arranged according to the chromatic scale.2. Ask them to play the open 6th string and name it out loud.3. Get them to move up a fret and play the note at the 1st fret on the 6th string and name that out loud.4. Get them to work on up the fretboard a step at a time naming each note, using sharp names for the notes that would be black on the piano.5. Coach them on this as necessary until they are happy they can do it.6. Now get them to play the notes up the 5th string in exactly the same manner.7. Repeat with the 2nd string and other strings as necessary until the student has got it for certain.8. Now go back to the 6th string, but this time start at the 12th fret and play and name the notes in descending order calling the black notes by their flat names.9. Repeat and coach as necessary then try the same thing on a few other strings.10. Ask the student: 'Are you now certain you could name any note anywhere on the fretboard given a few moments to work it out?11. If the answer is 'Yes' then congratulate the student (because there are a great many quite experienced guitar players who have never learnt to do this!)12. If the answer is 'No' then find out where the confusion is and go one step before that and repeat the steps above, taking extra care to check the student's comprehension and ability to apply this information at every step.

Lesson plan 10:

SPECIFIC REMEDIES TO PROBLEMS WITH COMPLETE BEGINNERS

Problem: Student very shy and nervous.

Appears unwilling to start lesson. Will often engage you in small talk in an attempt to avoid starting the lesson.

Probable cause(s): Highly likely that this student has had negative experiences of being taught at school or in earlier music lessons. Quite possibly they have been humiliated by previous teachers or parents in some way. Finding themselves in a situation of 'being taught something' restimulates all the negative emotions from these earlier incidents. This student will have a greatly exaggerated fear of failure. By not picking up the guitar they feel safe because you 'won't discover that they can't do it'.

Solution(s): Don't make the mistake of getting sidetracked by the small talk. A couple of minutes discussing the weather, their journey to your house or whatever is okay to break the ice, but what is needed is friendly, but firm control of the lesson.Keep it light and go in at a very shallow gradient. Use Lesson Plan 1 making a point of validating the student as they complete each objective. Work as if you have all the time in the world for them to follow your instructions. Avoid pressurizing body language.

Problem: Student has unusually small fingers

Due to age or simply physical build. This may be obvious from the outset (i.e. in the case of a 6 year-old), or something that becomes apparent as you try and teach them the first chord or two.

Solution(s): First it is worth looking at the guitar they are using. Small children should use a half-size guitar (usually tuned G C F Bb D G you stick a capo on your guitar at the 3rd fret then you can work with the same chord shapes). Three quarter size guitars are also available which are tuned to standard tuning.

Usually, people with smaller fingers will work better with single note playing than with chords, at least to start with. If you do work with chords, figure out simpler versions that they can play for the time being. This usually means restricting the chords to the top four strings.

It may be worth, especially in the case of adult students, showing them a simple stretching exercise. Place the left hand, palm down, flat on a table. Gently spread each adjacent pair of digits on the left hand using the thumb and forefinger of the right hand, holding the stretch for six seconds for each pair. A few weeks of this done two or three times a day and your student will find they can reach chord shapes that appeared impossible at first.

DefinitionVALIDATING: Praising, commending.

DefinitionPRESSURIZING BODY LANGUAGE: Leaning forward in your seat, fidgeting or showing any other signs of impatience towards the student.

Problem: Student has unusually long fingers

It is a fallacy that very long fingers automatically make playing the guitar easier. Of course it helps with certain shapes, but it makes others far more difficult. Whereas a person with small fingers will hate playing C and G7, someone with large fingers will struggle with D and B7.

Solution(s):

Working with a student's strengths rather than struggling against their weaknesses is a general principle that can be applied to good effect here. So, from the outset, select exercises and songs that utilise the students ability to stretch.

Lay in coordination exercises early on, so that the student builds good fingering habits with their single note playing.

It is likely that you can help this student by introducing barre chords earlier than usual, as they may actually find them easier to play, once they have the knack, than some of the more compact open chord shapes. Don't discount the more unusual barre chords C and G shapes for example they may find these easier than some of the E and A shapes.

Problem: Student has extremely large fingers

This can appear rather daunting. You get some large geezer with fingers like pork sausages and you look and think: how is he ever going to get a clean sound from his chords as the tip of each finger appears to spread across two strings!

Solution(s): Surprisingly, this problem seems to recede simply with time and practice. As finger tips harden the student is able to contact the strings using less and less of their finger tips.

Again, introducing coordination exercises early on helps a lot. So does the principle of working with strengths. This student may find barre chords easier than most, or they may take to using a movable F shape on the top five strings for example. Rocky numbers using nothing but 5th shape power chords might be a good idea.

Above all, don't allow the thought that this player is somehow disadvantaged one of the best technical exponents of guitar playing that I know would best be described as having hands like shovels and fingers like sausages, but he plays with the grace and fluency of a ballerina! Read up on the life story of Django Reinhardt - practice overcomes anything!

Problem: Student turns up at first lesson with unviable guitar

You can start learning to play guitar on almost any old hack of an instrument, but sensible limits should be applied. I have experienced quite a few variations on this over the years. One student turned up with a guitar brought back by relatives as a present from their holiday in Spain. The 'instrument' in question was quite clearly designed purely as an ornament to hang on the wall. The frets were equidistant one from another and all the strings of equal thickness! This was certainly the worst case of 'unviable guitar'.

Generally I look at three factors:

1. Can the guitar be tuned and will it stay in tune?2. Is the action of the guitar sufficiently low to make it playable, at least at the first three frets?3. Is the neck and body of the guitar of a size suitable for the student playing it?

Probable cause(s): This problem arises due to one or both of the following: The student has very limited financial resources. The student has absolutely no idea about what to look for when buying a guitar.

Solution(s): Some problems with guitars are treatable. High action can be lowered, neck angle can be adjusted, loose tremolo systems can be tightened up etc.. You have to make a decision as to whether you are going to get directly involved in making these adjustments or refer the client back to the local music shop. My advice is that if you are going to get involved get the client to leave the instrument with you and do it outside of lesson time. Charge an appropriate hourly rate for this service.

Other problems are best addressed by persuading the student to replace the guitar in question. Talk to the student about this. It's worth pointing out that as the student is going to be paying for lessons with you, it makes financial sense to buy an instrument that will help, rather than hinder their progress.

I generally offer to go with students to the local guitar shops and help them select a guitar. In doing this, I am looking after my own interests as a great many of my new clients come via referrals from the local music shops. A bit of mutual backscratching does no harm at all!

Problem: Student keeps hitting wrong strings

When doing single note exercises early on, a common problem is that the right hand finds itself out of sync with the left. So the student is fingering their blues scale notes fine with the left hand but the pick is hitting the wrong string up the other end resulting in a considerable amount of confusion and frustration for the student.

DefinitionUNVIABLE: Guitar can't be tuned or has impossibly high action. Also a guitar that is simply the wrong size for the student.

Probable cause(s): We all have a different level of ability to coordinate left to right. There are some clinically recognised medical conditions (forms of Dyspraxia or Ataxia) that may mean a particular student has this problem to a more severe degree, but these are very rare and you would normally have been made aware of them prior to taking the student on. So in almost all cases this is simply a question of asking the body to do something new.

Solution(s): Tell the student not to worry unduly about this phenomenon. It's worth explaining that the whole purpose of doing exercises like scales and speed developers is to develop coordination.

Get them to slow the exercise down. Get them to attempt it without looking at either hand. When they hit a wrong note ask them to stop and figure out what is happening. Then repeat the passage again making a conscious adjustment to correct. This will sometimes lead to over correction, in which case, keep going until the student has 'homed in' on the right actions. Keep it slow and keep the student relaxed about it. Tell them, both verbally and with your body language, that you have all the time in the world to allow them to correct this mistake and encourage them to take this attitude with themselves over it.

Finally, reassure the student that regular, little and often, practice will resolve these problems in due course.

Problem: Student complains of lack of rhythm

A common complaint in the early stages. The student plays along with you in the lesson and all goes fine, but when they get home they just can't seem to find the right strumming pattern for the song.

Probable cause(s): Hitting the right strumming pattern is largely just a knack that comes from experience. It doesn't mean that the student 'has no sense of rhythm' or is in any other way musically impaired. Once the student has a bit more experience under their belt this problem tends to fade away.

Solution(s): A very good and immediate pragmatic solution is to record yourself playing the song(s) in question on a tape or mini-disc. Record them slow enough to suit the student at whatever level of ability they are at with the material. They can then take this recording home and play it back to themselves to remind them of how the rhythm goes.

To enhance the student's rhythmic awareness I do teach specific strumming patterns (See Lesson plan 5) and also basic awareness of main time signatures. It is also worth spending time in the lesson having the student accompany you on muted guitar whilst you play through a rhythmically wide variety of songs. This helps them develop a range of their own natural strum patterns.

DefinitionDYSPRAXIA: Impaired or painful function of any organ of the body.

DefinitionATAXIA: Failure of muscular coordination; irregularity of muscular action.

Problem: Student complains of 'Bad sounding chords'

Try as they might, their chords are still full of buzzes and dead-sounding notes.

Probable cause(s): This is almost always simply a problem of expectations. Truth is that, for most people, it takes time to get chords clean.

Solution(s): Obviously, if the problem persists or the student is particularly hung up on it you should check the following:

1. Their guitar is not causing the problem (raised frets, knackered strings etc..)2. The student has their fingers placed optimally behind the frets.3. The student understands that it is the frets that stop the vibrations, not their fingers.4. The student is applying sufficient pressure.5. The student has tried different angles of approach, using the edges of their finger tips for example.6. The student is practicing often enough to get their finger-tips hardening.

After that it is 'just a question of mileage'.

When my students complain about this I tell them

Documents

lesson plans guitar.pdf