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This was at the end of the lesson, where we addressed his pick grip which contributes to stiffness in the movements of his right hand and his reducing his wide movements. While this is still new to him, the accuracy is still not exactly to be expected. However what has been drastically improved is how relaxed his hand and pick grip is. 

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This was at the beginning of Mihir’s class working on the blues riff of knock on wood. Can be seen that his picking is wide and swings outwards. This affects his accuracy in his targeting of the string set 4 5. The swinging outwards brings the pick very far away from the strings, allowing for more room for error when returning to re-articulate the strings especially in higher tempos as it has to travel a wider distance to return to the strings which is unnecessary. 

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Conclusion Reflection

This internship has been a very fruitful experience and has help me developed myself in many different ways.

From the educative standpoint, one of the biggest lessons i've learnt teaching music is that every student is different and learns in different ways. Often I find myself looking at very perplexed faces when I am teaching a concept and it calls for me to be able to find new ways and different angles to explain myself. Part of the fun is finding and improvising new and creative ways to reshape the way I explain them, and this has also helped reinforce and sometimes even change my own perspectives of these concepts. It has also helped shed light in my own understanding as there are times where I find myself unable to explain myself well, informing me that I need to brush up on that particular topic helping to elevate my own knowledge and understanding. I found that teaching really is the true test of your own knowledge and has been a very fruitful learning experience.

This internship has also helped me develop better social skills with my students, colleagues and my boss. Meeting new students sometimes can be quite daunting for myself and this experience has helped me practice how to engage and interact with new people. Overtime I found myself getting a better handle in it and I find myself less anxious. Trying to craft my lessons in a fun and engaging manner can be a challenge sometimes as when it's time to get down to the nitty gritty of the exercise practices, it can be very boring. I have learnt how to strike jokes to keep the mood alive and engaging and I found that it has helped the students grow a little more comfortable in class, especially for the kid students whom tend to be very reserved in the beginning.

Overall this internship has been a very fruitful and wholesome experience.

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Second Student

Timothy

Timothy is my second student whom I will be journaling and reflecting on. He is an adult student of mine with some minor background playing the guitar, but only learnt a few songs a few years ago and decided to seek formal training. This meant that he had some experience and some basic technique of the using the pick and a vague memory of some of his chord shapes, but had no knowledge and understanding of music. 

My main goals for him were widening his perspective of music, introduce theory, improve on fretboard knowledge and fundamentals. 

As a first lesson, I went through with him my fundamentals brief. Going through with him how many notes there are, how we move between them, where I can find these notes on the guitar fretboard, and how they work. I also covered the anatomy of the guitar and just some basic info to not only refresh, but to plug some missing background knowledge he might have. 

We covered through reciting our musical notes up and down to get used to the idea. Once he got a fairly decent handle reciting them up and down, it came to understanding where these notes are on the instrument. We spent the class mainly focusing on each string, reciting and playing each note to fret 12 and back down to the open string. This was the first “tool” that I introduced to him to understand how the navigation for the musical notes works on this fretboard, and how we can count up and figure out which note we are pressing. This is to help him break out of the layer of just memorising tabs and fret numbers, and elevating his knowledge of the fretboard in the layer of musical notations. This lack of awareness contributes to his ignorance of musical details in songs, but when compounded with other gaps in musical knowledge not addressed, it becomes hard for him to memorise songs as it is all based of muscle memory. I relate very closely with that struggle as I had gone through that problem. To tackle that issue, I introduced my understandings and approaches that has helped me improve on this issue and to break out of the habit of tabs. 

I also covered some basic ideas and perspectives and how to practicing the instrument, and we spent the remaining lesson going through some guided listening. The guided analytical listening was done to help shine a new light in the way we perceive music from a musicians point of view, and share some “invisible” skills and perspectives that might be known but are important when playing music. For example playing to a constant pulse internally to keep time. 

We spent our second lesson recapping what we went through in lesson 1, just to refill in any missing gaps that might have been lost through the week as well as to reinforce the knowledge. We then moved on to the next topic of key centers and scales. I introduced to him the major scale “formula” T T S T T T S, and we discussed the topic of tonality and key centers. The first layer I had to address was for him to be able to identify by ear when I was in key and out of key. This was a real test of my theory knowledge and and fun way of how I can creatively demonstrate this, having not planned out what I was going to play. I asked him to name me a nursery rhyme that he might remember. He suggested twinkle twinkle little star. I took a quick moment to orientate myself with the melody on my instrument and a basic harmonisation to take along with it. Once I had a mental bearing of the song, It was a test of how I could make it sound “wrong” moving into another key. I decided that it was first important to play the beginning of the phrase accurately so that as he listens he is attuned to the tonality that we are in. Then I would find first play around resolving the melody half a semitone away from its appropriate note. I would then ask him if that sounded correct and thankfully he is able to hear that something was not right with the sound. This allowed for me to address the point of understanding what it means to play in the key center, as well as the importance of developing a control for it.

Satisfied that he got the fundamental point that I was trying to make on this idea, we went through building our major scales, and finding C major on the guitar. Over the week he had to build up a list of all 12 major scales.

Coming back for our third lesson, we had reviewed through the scales he had built. The problem which I had found recurring amongst a majority of my students is the repeating of alphabets within the scale which is not conventional. For example F major was built as F G A A# C D E F. This made me reflect on an easier way to process this theory. Although I myself went through the route of force cramming the information in by spamming, I knew that this was not an effective method for everybody as it took an amount of effort. There had to be an easier way. Looking at the recurring mistakes, I found that when going through the steps when building the scale, it would be important to “take care” of each note first, meaning to ensure that every single musical alphabet music be present and there can be no repeated alphabets. Once this list of notes is built, we move to the second layer of adjusting the accidentals required in relationship to the formula. Once practicing through this idea, we rebuilt each scale again and progressively I found that Timothy had been slowly getting the idea and building up quicker and correctly through these steps. I realised as well that going through it in this way helps to reinforce the link between the alphabets and the scale degrees. For example C will be the 5 degree of F. C will be the flat 5th degree from F#. The alphabet has a close relationship to the degree number. 

Finding out this new perspective has made it easier for myself to understand and quickly access the notes of the scales which could only have been realised through teaching. This has helped me reinforce my fundamental understanding of perceiving my scales by thinking of it in a much simpler manner. 

Lastly was to take this existing knowledge and applying it to a song to see how these tools are used in context. To keep things simple, we used twinkle twinkle little star as the base song for practice. After breaking down the melody into its scale degree units (1 1 5 5 6 6 5 . 4 4 3 3 2 2 1) we took it to different keys to practice what the notes were of the chosen key, and finding the notes in different positions of the guitar. For example in the key of F (F F C C D D C . Bb Bb A A G G F). Once we were clear of the notes in the melody, we took it to finding where these notes were on the guitar. 

This practice works on covers different learning aspects in each of the steps. First is understanding how a melody relates to a key center, and the mental calculation of the notes in the given key helps us practice our scales with the consideration of what the note names are as well as its relationship to the scale. Second is the building the relationship with fretboard. Once we are clear of the notes, spending the time to work out where we can access these notes on the instrument helps us build a foundational knowledge of note names to the fret number. This helps to break away from the idea of approaching the fretboard as buttons, and develop a relationship of what the note names are of each string and fret with the context of the song. 

This practice aside, we also discussed these ideas with the songs that we were practicing on. The first song we were working on together was Chasing Cars by Snow Patrol. After covering through the notes and chords to play in the song, I guided him through with what the key of the song was a worked out the notes that we were playing as musical alphabets on the guitar. To make my point, I asked him to play notes that were outside of the scale while playing with the song. The dissonance cause from it allowed for Timothy to understand the importance of playing in a specific key of the song and how this idea is applied in the context of the song. This has also allowed him to develop a basic level of aural sensitivity to identifying when we are playing the correct notes and the wrong notes with the song. 

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First Student

Mihir - Trinity Grade 2

My first student whom I will be focusing on for this internship Journal is Mihir, a 13 year old student who is preparing to take the Trinity Rock and Pop Grade 2 exam. He has been passed over to me from another guitar instructor in the school who was leaving. So he has had some basics and experience.

When Mihir first came to me, we spent some time getting to know each other and for myself to plan out our lessons ahead. We had spent the first few lessons covering through the fundamentals such as our tuning notes on the guitar, the notes of our musical systems as well as how to negotiate them on the guitar. We then moved on to our finger exercises practice to work on the coordination between the left and the right hand. My main goal in this initial stage of covering through the fundamentals was to provide him with the basic tools of negotiating the guitar, so that he would not be lost.

This being a relatively try topic, I could see that he was starting to feel bored as we progressed through class. His nature in the beginning was relatively quiet and not exactly fully engaged. Seeing this, I had made it a point to try and make him laugh to engage with him better and to bring him out of his shell a little more so that he can feel more comfortable. When on the topic of key centres and chord progressions and the idea of "home" in music, I improvised a story of a journey out to the market to contextualise the progression. Making use of this opportunity I made some weird outrageous events in the story to try and make him laugh. And success! I managed to get him to laugh and he has been a little bit more open and interactive. Overtime he has even shown a little of his cheeky side which helps add to the enjoyment of our class together. I found that the energy and the way I carry myself contributed heavily in the enjoyment factor. Exuding a cheerful personality and adding some laughs into the conversation helped break the ice.

Song 1 - Twist and Shout, The Beatles

This is the first song we started tackling as it was a technical focus therefore a little harder. We spent the first part of the lesson going through guided listening solely by ear. We discussed a few points needed as a beginning foundation to understanding the song: 1) tempo - clapping along to the pulse of the song 2) form - how many section, how long each sections were 3) describing what the guitarist was doing (strumming, picking single notes) 

This was to help kickstart the activation of ears and start being conscious of what he was listening to, as well as gain an understanding of the form through listening. I found that he was not sensitive to the idea of a pulse as when I asked him to clap for me the pulse, he was clapping the guitar’s comping rhythm instead. But this misunderstanding was easily rectified as he had a quick understanding of what I was looking for and was easily able to adjust. After going through this, we double checked with the chart in the book and continued on with learning it on the song. 

I went through the first 4 bars of the groove by imitating me first before we ran out of time for our lesson. Mihir found the first comping rhythm to be is a technically challenging (as it should be for where he’s at!) as the the comping required to the smooth transitioning between from single line picking to strumming. This required a level of technical finesse for the right picking hand to transition from small movements to large strokes for the chords. There was also a challenge for the left hand to transition playing single notes to targeting chords accurately. And of course with the added last layer of coordinating both hands together in time, it was very difficult for him to get a single clean note out. Mihir tended to have very broad movements when he picked single notes which contributed to a lack of accuracy targeting the correct string. 

It was particularly challenging coming up with a practice routine to tackle this technical aspect of this phrase for mihir as there were multiple fundamental problems that needed to be address. After taking a moment to analyse and reflect after class, I came to the conclusion that although there were still much gaps in musical understanding, that stage cannot be addressed yet until the mechanics are properly sorted. 

Routine technical exercises. The next lesson came up and I had spent the main bulk lesson introducing technical exercises to try and sort them out. We went through single note finger exercises up and down the string with a metronome, and finished up our class workshopping the groove again. While going through the exercise, I found that Mihir’s attention span started to drift after a short while. I tried grabbing his attention span back by talking with him and joking around for a bit between breaks. While effective in isolation for the timespan of the lesson, I found that it might not have been the right approach as the following lesson came by and of course, he does not practice these things at home on his own. I tried muscling it through for another lesson, hoping to see if he gets the point. However it became clear that in his position these exercises were boring and was insistent on not doing them. It became evident to me that in his position as a kid that these routine exercises although very helpful and “nutritious” for his development, might not be the most effective way to go around it. 

Back to the drawing board. 

I found myself reflecting to when I myself was a kid taking music lessons and not listening to my teachers advice to try relating to Mihir’s position. I realised that for while I did not spend time practicing these exercises when I first started out, I practiced the song directly and that was what helped me grow in the beginning phases while maintain an interest as I was doing it. It was only until I started stagnating did I realise for myself the importance of fundamental practice. 

Shifting the focus. 

Adopting a new mindset, I decided that it would be more effective to approach this by workshopping each section of the comping groove piece by piece on loop, slowly adding on one note or phrase at a time on loop. This tackles the technical issues directly, while not stepping away from the music which focusing on finger exercises has caused. While still important, I incorporated it as a routine warm up as we began class just to ensure that the time is still clocked in. 

A few lessons progressed as we were grinding it out and improvements can be seen. Mihir was more interested in getting to the instrument as on top of the small improvements in playing, he has been reporting that he has been practicing at home as well. 

This experience made me realise the importance of relating to the student and his struggles in his position, as trying to enforcing and impose your own way of doing things might not be the most effective way for them. It also highlighted to me what was necessary for the student at his current level, as adding more things stray them away from the point and worse case possible kill they joy in it.

Song 2 - Summer of 69', Bryan Adams

The main focus of this song was on the palm muting technique. This was something that was new to Mihir and he had difficulty trying to get the effect out. It brought light to his current picking technique as he is only used to strumming big strokes and this causes not only the picking angle to be a little off, but unwanted strings were also being articulated as well. So a big thing that we were working on in this song to help with his fundamentals was to get used to the idea of picking in small "economical" movements instead. He understood the approach fairly quickly as we have been addressing these issue since the first song. It was simply a matter of getting down to it and workshopping it to improve on the consistency.

This being a song that Mihir enjoys because of the energy of the song, it was much easier for him to engage and practice this song. It did not take much time working through this song, once we went through the different sections, it was a matter of cleaning up the technique, and addressing some of the more glaring problems in class. This was issues of tempo as he has a tendency of rushing, and cleanliness of technique. Guiding through imitation has been helpful in his progress. He has been fairly self-sufficient in working out this song, and worked on the gelling of the sections together by himself as he like to play through the whole song. 

Song 3 - Knock on Wood, Eddie Floyd

A song that Mihir had chosen on his own because of how he enjoyed the feeling of the pocket. This was a blues song with a very classic use of the blues rock riff 1 - 5 to 1 - 6. 

Playing this was however was a challenge for Mihir again the same few issue with his picking. However I would say that at this point, much improvement has a been made with the work that he has put in for the previous two songs. This time it was a matter of consistency, and one of my main focuses for him was to lighten his pick holding and targeting 2 strings at once which was a challenge. 

To get my point across, I got him to lighten up his pick grip to relax his hand and allow for him to not pick so far away from the strings. I found that his picking was very still and sprung outwards away from the strings. Getting him to lighten up his grip and trying to play a little softer to exaggerated the movements so he can understand how small the movements actually need to be. 

After workshopping it for the duration of the lesson, he managed to find a nice sweet spot in the movement. Reflecting it as we were ending class, he also mentioned that he did find this had helped make his movements a lot easier. 

Overall, I believe that adapting my mindset and approach to learning songs in this manner has been effective. It was important for him to struggle through song first to understand that some of his fundamentals and bad habits needed to be fixed. Using the song as the exercise has also been very effective as it served as a really good practice model to work on technique. And I believe overtime it was effective as his results for his grade 2 exam was a Merit which was awesome. 

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Rhythms

Rhythms are important too!

These are the notes that I would usually draw out to explain the rhythmic notations.

Clapping exercises. With the guitar still a very foreign item to them, taking it away for a moment and spending time just clapping rhythms allows for the students to understand the feeling and the spaces fundamentally.

Once they have an understanding of the rhythms and the subdivisions, we would take it back to the guitar.

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Foundation

Foundation is important!

With most of my students coming from no musical background or instrumental background, these are the fundamentals that I would cover with them to begin with.

Learning the "white key" notes!

Having them recite the 7 alphabets of the notes up and down helps to internalise what the baseline is that we're working with.

C D E F G A B C

Introducing the "black key" notes! I found that it has been easier for the students to learn where the black key notes by remembering the opposite. No black key note between E F , and B C.

We would then take it to the guitar and count up the frets one by one on each string. I found this to be a helpful tool for the my students to firstly practice reciting our notes up and down to get used to the correct note names. Secondly to learn where these notes are on the fretboard. This has been a helpful tool as whenever they are lost on what note they are pressing, they can count up from the open string note to find where they are at.

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Guitar Course Music Lab

One of my first few tasks was to create a brief overview of the Guitar course for enquiries of the school to have a general understanding of what they can expect if they were to sign up for our classes. Drafting this up, I had to consider which skills sets and knowledge should be expected in ones musical journey. After creating a draft, I had also consulted with another guitar instructor Paul Daniel to help vet through and to see if his overall lesson structures aligns with what was written. Coming from a different stylistic background and with years more experience than me, he has been very helpful in some of the terms to present out and additional lesson topics that I may have missed out especially for the Advanced section. Seeing as I have not had as much experience teaching or playing other styles such as rock or metal, I had been unaware of some of the skills needed in order to play those types of genres and the stylistic skills requirements needed in order to achieve it. For example finger tapping, whammy bar etc.

Planning and writing this out has also help me organise my own syllabus structure better in a more thoughtful and clearer manner. Using this as a general guide, it has been easier for me to plan out my lesson topics as well as to cover certain areas which I may have not considered to cover.

This task has required me to reflect upon my entire musical journey thus far and what I have learnt. It has help brought light to some fundamental areas of my practice which I have neglected and has helped me think clearer of my own objectives and plans for my own musical practices.

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Introduction

I conducted my internship at The Music Lab music school as a guitar instructor. This is for me to gain experience in the role as a music educator. My main aims were to understand how to structure up a syllabus for my students and how can I convey them in a meaningful way.