What Piano Teachers can learn from Guitar Pedagogy?

I have always been fascinated by Guitar Pedagogy.

Although I don't play the instrument per say, I have always considered the work that Guitar Teachers do to be far more relevant 'musically' compared to how we Piano Teachers go about doing our job.

Don't get me wrong. I am by no way diminishing the work that Piano Teachers do. After all, we uphold Tradition and wisdom passed down by the Masters. But we are too married to the score to engage freely with Music.

While there is no Standardized system called Guitar Pedagogy, what I find extremely interesting is that, most of the Guitar teaching happens without a Method Book (something Piano Teaching cannot Teach without).. Even when a Method Book is used, I have observed that they're used as song references for Chords.

The most coolest thing that Guitar students do right from the get-go, they play Songs and Chords. Even a Beginner Student who has only learnt for a month would know a bunch of Major and minor Chords. And they don't have to wait till it is taught Theoretically based on Scales (the way we approach Chords in Piano Teaching). Infact, most of them don't even READ Notation, but they all get to experience Music.

I am not saying that Guitar Teaching is perfect or without Flaws. And neither am I saying that Piano Pedagogy is all wrong.

What I am saying is that, perhaps it is a good idea to learn from other Teaching philosophies so as to deepen our craft as an Educator.

Let me Illustrate by giving you a Recent Example of our Guitar Department's Student Jam.

1) The Guitar Faculty leads the workshop with some students of the Department. But students play an active role in shaping the music that gets played and how it gets played

2) The Students are of different Skill Levels and Experiences (Couple of them started learning the Guitar a month ago, while a few had been learning for a couple of years)

3) The Guitar Teachers first got everyone to Tune their Instruments and then called out some chords that everyone strummed together .. CALIBRATE!!

4) The Guitar teachers then Randomly Selected 4 students to present songs that they had already learnt (either Melody or Chords). The four students selected the following Songs - Aura Lee, theme from New World Symphony, Hotel California and Lazarus (Porcupine Tree)

5) Each student then presented their song by telling the rest of the group the following about their song - Time Signature, Strum Patterns and Chord Progressions used

6) The other students wrote down the Chords that was dictated

7) For Beginner Students, the Guitar Teachers gave Chord Substitutions based on what they knew

8) The Guitar Teachers also simplified Chords for students (eg, play Chord Root Note only if unsure of what to strum)

9) Then the student Counted In, and the entire Group began to Play the Chords. Each Song was Broken into Phrases, and the entire group practiced the song Phrase by Phrase, till a decent flow was achieved, then they played it all together few times. Those who knew the Lyrics sang and Played

10) Students who able to, were encouraged to Improvise

11) Students interacted with each other and helped each other when someone was struggling a bit

12) Even the beginners were quick to Generalize on how certain Phrases had different Melodies but same Chords. Even Tricky/Unusual Chords were played and they managed to participate

13) These Steps were Repeated with the Next Song

14) The entire exercise was useful in developing relevant Musical Skills : Learning to play in Ensemble with other musicians, Keeping Time and Tempo, Learning about Chord Substitutions, Thinking about Phrase Structures, Helping out fellow Musicians when they found something challenging, Listening, deepening Music Theory, Learning about Songs that you are not aware of

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I am sure that these are skills that even we as Piano Teachers want our students to develop (heck, we ourselves want those skills).

Infact, most of what I listed above from the Workshop can be done with Piano Students also. And no, I am not talking about Advanced Jazz Workshops here, but something more accessible!!

Maybe its time for a re-think?