Tips on teaching

[Mikael Dez]

I meant when you leave it in your will for him.

I mean, I figure if you have a younger relative, who ends up a guitar player, it just seems to make sense. Especially if you had a hand in inspiring him to play in the first place.

But if you hadn't broken his left-handed playing early on like you did, he'd have to just sell it.

I have no one to leave my shit to now at this point other than him if he keeps it up, otherwise I’ll just leave it to my daughter to sell. So you have a point

 

[JasonE]

My brother is a lefty who plays righty. It works for him. Most left handed people do some things right handed. I think about the only thing my brother does left handed is eat. I have a brother-in-law that is left handed too. He also does most things right handed.

 

[Mikael Dez]

My brother is a lefty who plays righty. It works for him. Most left handed people do some things right handed. I think about the only thing my brother does left handed is eat. I have a brother-in-law that is left handed too. He also does most things right handed.

Yeah he bats right handed, and so far I don’t see any issues with his playing other than typical beginner stuff

 

[Sascha Franck]

As said before, one of my mates who went right handed while being a left hander regrets it to this day (and he's a working professional guitarist). So much that he actually considered switching after being 20 years or so in.

 

[Sascha Franck]

And fwiw, I'm not even saying it's always the best choice to use your strong hand for the picking duties, but there's still very good reasons why that most of the times is a good idea.

 

[Genghis]

Great read so far and it sounds like it’s going well. With all of my students I try to give them some basic technique while showing them simple songs as soon as possible. I make it clear up front that they will have a bit of boring and difficult work at first, but if they put in the time to practice it gets to be a lot of fun fairly soon.

Another key point I make is that it is much better to practice 10 minutes a day than to practice an hour the day before the lesson. I also stress that it is even better to practice more each day, but to always stop and allow for rest if they start to feel tension in the hands.

I currently only teach one kid who is about 12 and two adults, but the kid is really doing great and is taking voice lessons from the best voice teacher I have ever met. I told him to give both of us a shoutout when he gets his first Grammy!

 

[Mikael Dez]

Great read so far and it sounds like it’s going well. With all of my students I try to give them some basic technique while showing them simple songs as soon as possible. I make it clear up front that they will have a bit of boring and difficult work at first, but if they put in the time to practice it gets to be a lot of fun fairly soon.

Another key point I make is that it is much better to practice 10 minutes a day than to practice an hour the day before the lesson. I also stress that it is even better to practice more each day, but to always stop and allow for rest if they start to feel tension in the hands.

I currently only teach one kid who is about 12 and two adults, but the kid is really doing great and is taking voice lessons from the best voice teacher I have ever met. I told him to give both of us a shoutout when he gets his first Grammy!

At what point do you start introducing scales? I have him practicing the A, E and C major chords right now, but he’s gunning to play metal so I’ve been teaching him fundamentals like hammer ons/pull offs, power chords, and palm muting. It’s definitely enough for him to chew on right now so I don’t want to overwhelm him sigh anything else at the moment.

 

[TSJMajesty]

At what point do you start introducing scales?

I'd say now. But I'd show him the intervals that are used in how a major scale is created- W-W-H-W-W-W-H, as opposed to teaching him various scales. Pick one key to start with so he can see how those intervals work across the strings. Maybe G major, since the relative minor is Em, which is very common on guitar. And then just let that sink in.

 

[Mikael Dez]

I'd say now. But I'd show him the intervals that are used in how a major scale is created- W-W-H-W-W-W-H, as opposed to teaching him various scales. Pick one key to start with so he can see how those intervals work across the strings. Maybe G major, since the relative minor is Em, which is very common on guitar. And then just let that sink in.

Wish me luck lol

 

[Sascha Franck]

At what point do you start introducing scales?

Does he have interest in scalar playing? If so, now.

But I'd show him the intervals that are used in how a major scale is created- W-W-H-W-W-W-H, as opposed to teaching him various scales.

IMO defenitely not a great thing to start with at all. Any theoretic stuff will rather scare folks at first.

I'd rather go for some easy shapes and patterns and how you can move them. Obviously, the good old minor pentatonic is still kinda useful as it's easy to play - but I'd try to move away from it a bit rather soon-ishly as there's too many people who just get stuck with the ease of pentatonic patterns so they never really move on.

If you can, try to engage him in finding notes on the fretboard. "look, here's that A note. Fits over that Amin chord I've just shown you. The note 3 frets above also fits - and now try to find other A notes and play the note 3 frets above as well". This could teach him various things and it'd likely be a little bit of ear training, too.

And throw in a little easy lick here and there, kinda like a bonus.