Teaching guitar to groups of children can be the most fun and financially rewarding part of a guitar teacher's week
I really did not want to teach kids to play guitar! When I started to do so I was already a professional player and teacher and I thought that my calling was to teach intermediate and advanced musicians to get themselves to the point that they could become the players that they wanted to be. The educational equivalent of the icing on the cake if you will. Its not that I thought that teaching kids was beneath me or anything like that its just that I thought that it was not for me. To say now that the most enjoyable and fulfilling part of my teaching week is more often than not the sessions that I spend teaching groups of kids during the first couple of years of their guitar playing journey is one of the most surprising things (to me anyway) about my teaching career.
I did not go looking for work teaching the youngest children. I had more than enough work teaching "one on one" in high schools, colleges and through my private teaching practice. This employment, combined with my gigging activities meant that I felt that I was busy enough. Then I was "emotionally blackmailed" by a friend to take over some guitar lessons from another teacher at a local school at short notice (apparently the guy who was going to start teaching the kids had decided that it was not for him and they had a bunch of students already signed up and ready to go). It was one of the biggest favours that anyone has ever done me (Thanks Andy!). I love teaching younger kids and to be honest if I could only keep one type of teaching on then my work with groups of young kids would be difficult to give up.
One of the main reasons I would hate to lose this kind of work is (lets face it) that in terms of money earned per hour it is difficult to beat. When working in schools I typically teach groups of between four and six kids for half an hour at a time with the lessons being funded directly by the parents (and not the school) and paid for (in advance) at the start of each semester. If you look at what the "going rate" for a group activity is where you live and then multiply it by ten (the average number of students I will see in a one hour time period) then put in crude terms it is possible to make what would be a reasonable full day's pay for just a couple of hours of (what I laughingly call) work in the morning. Do the same in the afternoon at another school and you are well ahead of the game Do that for three days per week for thirty or so days per year and you may generate enough money to have a life?
There are challenges involved when teaching children's groups but the secret is in preparation. If you have a plan and know what you are working towards then the job can sometimes seem to just about do itself.Teaching Kids Guitar :The Plan
Luckily the plan (like all the best plans) is simple. Everything you do in the lessons is to work towards the following objectives....Enable kids to learn to form and strum the eight guitar chords that they need to learn first
and........
Have them be able to move between those chords in time to music
That is all that you need to be doing. If they get there then you will have enabled your students to turn themselves into guitar players
In terms of the material covered teaching groups of children is no different to teaching a single child. Regardless of the circumstances in which they learn they still need to form the same eight shapes (shown above) and to move between them. To get a handle on this material and a tried and tested method you could look at this Overview of how to teach guitar to kids or you could just go to the first of five pages that we have up here looking at a series of lessons for younger children.
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The Kid's Guitar Teaching Package
Over forty sheets to download and use in your guitar teaching today. This material is designed to run alongside the "Backing Tracks and Handouts Package . All of the resources that you will need in order to teach kids to play guitar. Chord Charts, One finger (reduced) chord diagrams etc. An opportunity to start any young would be guitar player off the right way!
Our Backing Tracks and Handouts Package
20 Backing Tracks and 46 Handouts. An invaluable teaching aids designed to help you to teach both rhythm and lead guitar to younger and older students alike Great for helping to develop a good dense of timing
The Guitar Teacher's Toolkit
100 printable sheets dealing with Open Chords-Bar Chords-Scales- Modes- Blank Fretboard and Chord Grids Teaching Diary and Business Card Designs
Plus 100 Giant (letter sized) Chord Grids
laminate them in order to help you to teach group guitar lessons, distribute them to your students or just stick on your teaching studio wall? The "Coolest Wallpaper on the planet?"
And a freebie from us to you!
The Bass Guitar Teacher's Toolkit
Over 60 Handouts for anyone who already teaches (or who wishes to teach) bass guitar covering Scales, Chords, Fingering Exercises etc
Over 300 Sheets and 20 Backing tracks to Download and use TODAY!
Everything you need to start or improve a guitar teaching business! It's all there!
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