Marketing & Philosophy
Teaching Philosophy & Student Connection
Forming a genuine and lasting connection with your students is paramount to their success and to yours as a teacher. Here I'll share some things to help keep you in that role and to exercise your role of mentor with responsibility and compassion.
Jason Aaron Wood
Lesson instructor:
Professional guitarist, teacher & music education entrepreneur. Teaching since 2008.
Teaching Philosophy & Student Connection
In this section, I'll cover specific principles & philosophies that will make you more effective and beneficial as a teacher.
What to Teach:
It ultimately boils down to this:
Techniques
(The "playing" in "guitar playing")
(The "playing" in "guitar playing")
Theory concepts
(that includes harmony AND rhythm)
(that includes harmony AND rhythm)
ACTIVITIES to APPLY these things
(so they can encounter & experience the built-in challenges, AND to have the student deliberately be creative with them)
(so they can encounter & experience the built-in challenges, AND to have the student deliberately be creative with them)
Your Job is SOLVING PROBLEMS, not merely "showing people stuff."
This means that the topics you address need to help students overcome difficulties and obstacles they face, so you need to:
Have your finger on the pulse of what guitarists typically struggle with (even if they don't know that's what's holding them back)*
Find/develop specific exercises that address those problems (or bypass them in some cases)
In some cases teach them how to THINK (what to think about/focus on) when doing those things
* What guitarists struggle with is not always the same as what guitarists want to learn about — so while you don't want your students deciding their own curriculum (if you care about their results), you may want to strike a balance between what they WANT to cover and what YOU know they actually NEED — and develop a talent for being adaptable enough to give them both wherever possible.
Guidelines
Here are a few guidelines that have helped me to be much more effective as a teacher:
Give the student small successes right away (especially beginners!).
If you can find a familiar examples of a technique or music theory concept being used, use that as a starting point for introducing that technique or concept, but don't let that riff or part or melody be the entire lesson.
Create variations on the spot after you've established the basic idea of whatever you are teaching. Show them how you made those variations, too, so their practice isn't one-dimensional. Give them the tools to create their own exercises from source material.
You're trying to walk them through the built-in challenges and experience them themselves and solve the problems that arise themselves, with you there to help them, not for you to just give them all the answers. Teach them how to solve problems.
With everything you go in expecting to teach, be prepared to immediately pivot and either simplify it or make it more advanced to meet the student at their challenge level.
Aim for a breakthrough or "aha!" moment in every lesson if you can. Real progress comes from these epiphanies, when something "clicks" and the student suddenly makes connections, not from just being "shown" things.
Tablature is "training wheels" — by all means use it in the beginning stages of introducing an unfamiliar topic or skill to students, but generally avoid it. Instead, rely more on diagrams because tablature is extremely limiting and frames it erroneously as "doing it right" (as if there's only one right way to play something) instead of exploring the literally infinite options. Tablature is too rigid because it gives one example and implies anything outside of what's written is "wrong," when in reality the example in the tablature is merely "step 1" or "example 1." The student needs to UNDERSTAND what's on the page though, in order to move on to "step 2" or "example 2" — this goes back to creating variations on every idea, and teaching the student how to do this as well. Because just like training wheels, the student needs to get beyond relying on the first, single example they're given and start internalizing the patterns they learn. And all too often, when this doesn't happen, "collecting tablature" starts to become a crutch, a convenient placeholder of "going through the motions" that consists solely of someone else doing the thinking for them. The thinking IS the work, though. Teach them to do THAT.
Teach students how to PRACTICE EFFECTIVELY.
Try to give as much information as you can without overwhelming your students. Each student will have their own threshold, so try not to exceed that with the given topic, but also don't underwhelm them, lest you appear to be intentionally spreading the lesson content thin, or insult their intelligence by implying that's all they're ready for.
(The notion of "don't jump ahead!" that many teachers who teach from books often face is a good example of purposely spreading the content thin — the STUDENT'S pace is the RIGHT PACE.)
(The notion of "don't jump ahead!" that many teachers who teach from books often face is a good example of purposely spreading the content thin — the STUDENT'S pace is the RIGHT PACE.)
Retention
It doesn't do much good to keep chasing after NEW students if they don't stick around. (And if course if your students DON'T stick around, then you actually HAVE to spend your time chasing after new ones.)
So it's essential that you also retain the students you have.
Here are some ways to do that:
Monthly lesson packages (not lesson-to-lesson):
This ensures they're invested for at least 4 lessons at a time.
This ensures they're invested for at least 4 lessons at a time.
Subscriptions:
Having them commit to an automatic payment plan shows they're serious about learning and that they recognize this is an ongoing journey you're guiding them on, not just a one-and-done quick fix with no long-erm commitment.
Having them commit to an automatic payment plan shows they're serious about learning and that they recognize this is an ongoing journey you're guiding them on, not just a one-and-done quick fix with no long-erm commitment.
Accountability to Themselves:
Remind them occasionally of what they said their goals are, and give them content that supports those goals. They'd feel bad if you're the only one working toward THEIR goals, and if they've been slacking off this might give them the little nudge they need to get moving forward again. (To be clear though, don't MAKE them feel bad; you should always be the person they WANT to be around, and that happens when people feel GOOD about themselves when they're around you.)
Remind them occasionally of what they said their goals are, and give them content that supports those goals. They'd feel bad if you're the only one working toward THEIR goals, and if they've been slacking off this might give them the little nudge they need to get moving forward again. (To be clear though, don't MAKE them feel bad; you should always be the person they WANT to be around, and that happens when people feel GOOD about themselves when they're around you.)
Give Them Frequent Wins:
Keep giving them achievable mini-goals along the way. That gives them something to feel good about in the lessons, and can keep them motivated to keep going.
Keep giving them achievable mini-goals along the way. That gives them something to feel good about in the lessons, and can keep them motivated to keep going.
CELEBRATE their Successes:
Feeling recognition for your achievements is just a basic human need, and as their teacher, you're the one they need to hear that from. And it's worth even more when you are so excited for them that you want to shout it from the rooftops when they succeed, by sharing their successes with your audience! In fact, it's also good for your marketing to show off what your students are doing well, because that's social proof!
Feeling recognition for your achievements is just a basic human need, and as their teacher, you're the one they need to hear that from. And it's worth even more when you are so excited for them that you want to shout it from the rooftops when they succeed, by sharing their successes with your audience! In fact, it's also good for your marketing to show off what your students are doing well, because that's social proof!
Give them Ways to Track Their Progress:
Whether it's their dedicated practice notebook, or a chart you keep up with, or a form built-in to your website, giving your students a way to continually track their progress not only gets them more invested in the process, but also allows them to SEE their actual progress over time, and this shows them that working with you is paying off.
Whether it's their dedicated practice notebook, or a chart you keep up with, or a form built-in to your website, giving your students a way to continually track their progress not only gets them more invested in the process, but also allows them to SEE their actual progress over time, and this shows them that working with you is paying off.
Keep it FUN:
Fun is the main fuel source. Some guitarists may have occasional bursts of extreme motivation, but that WILL run out if it isn't FUN. This means your lessons need to be fun, but ALSO teach them fun things to do on their own. You are the source of fun but the whole process needs to be fun, because if it starts to feel like a chore eventually they'll just stop doing it.
Fun is the main fuel source. Some guitarists may have occasional bursts of extreme motivation, but that WILL run out if it isn't FUN. This means your lessons need to be fun, but ALSO teach them fun things to do on their own. You are the source of fun but the whole process needs to be fun, because if it starts to feel like a chore eventually they'll just stop doing it.
Additional Perspectives
Here are a few other guiding principles to keep in mind as a teacher:
Never decide FOR a student that THEY live too far away to come to you. Let THEM decide that entirely on their own. Many students welcome the escape from their own environment, so don't talk them out of becoming your client just because YOU wouldn't be willing to travel that distance. You're offering value — let anyone who wants it travel however far they want. I once had a student drive to me here in Maryland from Nashville, Tennessee, as a birthday gift to themselves.
Always be adaptable. They're coming to you for guidance, and there's no limit to how many different forms that can take.
If you're working on your own music outside of lessons, find a way to make what you're doing relevant to your students, and you can use your own musical works-in-progress as part of the actual lesson content. This allows you to piggyback one musical project on top of the other, and your students get to see what music creation looks like in real life. I've had backing track riffs from solo writing lessons become parts of my songs, and I've used stripped-down versions of my songs as backing tracks. I've taught how to write song intros, and ended up finishing and releasing the songs from those lessons. This is how you solve the "not enough hours in a day" problem: Marry your two music careers!
Sometimes teaching is like getting a dog to take a pill. You may need to hide what you're actually getting them to do in packaging that's more appealing...generally something more fun. But then again, if you have to do that, it probably should've been that fun to begin with. So just make everything as fun as you can.
Sometimes students really just want (or even need) someone to talk to. If it's a 1-on-1 session and they won't be disrupting a whole class by doing that, just let them. If they're paying you for your 1-on-1 time and want to talk through the whole thing, sure, make some effort to teach them what you had planned & get the lesson back on track, but if talking to you is more important to them, you can always scale it back & tell them what you were GOING to go over at the end, and tell them there's not enough time left so you'll have to do that next week. Then just update their practice routine with some specific changes to what they were already doing. Now next week's lesson is already planned out well in advance.
If you have to raise your rates, it's always easier to do with new students who never got a chance to get accustomed to your old, lower rates.
You can fire a student if needed. The client isn't exclusively in the position to only fire you. If they're unreasonable, combative, or otherwise overtly unpleasant, you don't have to keep them on as a student.
It's been rare, but I've had to fire at least 5 students that I can think of off the top of my head. And it wasn't always entirely a feeling of "good riddance" that came with it, either.
On one occasion it was a student I rather liked, but who had taken something the wrong way and proceeded to get very carried away with a misguided sense of injustice over it, and left me no choice but to stop working with them and redefine my policies about that aspect of the lessons. I didn't straight up tell this student "you're fired," but rather, I explained calmly "Well I'm glad we discussed this, and I'm glad you brought it to my attention, however this makes me realize I need to address this for the future, so as of right now, this class is now closed. Once I get this sorted out, if you want, I can reach out and let you know when a new class opens up." He was visibly sad and a bit embarrassed, and it made me sad too, but unfortunately he had made it impossible to go forward continuing to work together. So "closing the class" was an effective way to sever the relationship. And I did indeed update my policies to prevent that kind of misunderstanding from ever being my problem again by explictly stating what the expectation should be.
In another case, a child student's parent made the relationship impossible and I eventually had to fire the parent and tell them how unfortunately they were costing their child their lessons.
Sometimes people are just impossible, so don't feel SHACKLED to that income. Your mental health is just as important.
It's been rare, but I've had to fire at least 5 students that I can think of off the top of my head. And it wasn't always entirely a feeling of "good riddance" that came with it, either.
On one occasion it was a student I rather liked, but who had taken something the wrong way and proceeded to get very carried away with a misguided sense of injustice over it, and left me no choice but to stop working with them and redefine my policies about that aspect of the lessons. I didn't straight up tell this student "you're fired," but rather, I explained calmly "Well I'm glad we discussed this, and I'm glad you brought it to my attention, however this makes me realize I need to address this for the future, so as of right now, this class is now closed. Once I get this sorted out, if you want, I can reach out and let you know when a new class opens up." He was visibly sad and a bit embarrassed, and it made me sad too, but unfortunately he had made it impossible to go forward continuing to work together. So "closing the class" was an effective way to sever the relationship. And I did indeed update my policies to prevent that kind of misunderstanding from ever being my problem again by explictly stating what the expectation should be.
In another case, a child student's parent made the relationship impossible and I eventually had to fire the parent and tell them how unfortunately they were costing their child their lessons.
Sometimes people are just impossible, so don't feel SHACKLED to that income. Your mental health is just as important.
Short of "firing" a student, some students may demonstrate that they're not be the best fit for training "live" with you (whether in person or virtually over Zoom), but that doesn't mean you need to disqualify them entirely from being your paying client. In fact this is an excellent incentive for YOU to create some courses that you can refer people like that to, so they're kept at an arm's length but still able to benefit their playing and help your business without direct interaction.
If you find you prefer to work with only intermediate and above students on certain topics, you can also create entry-level courses, and treat them as pre-requisites for working with you directly. Basically 'come see me when you've completed ____.'
The more students you have, the easier it is to fit them into group classes by common interest. It's generally only hard to figure out when you only have a couple of students. The answer is more students.
If you have an idea for a new group class, you can get it started with just one student. Offer them the (cheaper) group rate, and tell them they'll have the class to themselves until someone else joins, and then go actively market that class and start recruiting students specifically for that class. That way you'll still be teaching generally that same thing during that same time slot, but you can multiply your income by adding more students with the same interests, and turn it into a community centered around fun activities instead of instantly maxing out your potential income at the 1-on-1 rate.
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Components of a Teaching Business
Defining Your Niche & Target Student
Subscription vs. One-Off Lessons
Crafting Clear Cancellation & No-Show Policies & Providing Replacement Lessons
Advance Payment & Subscription Models
Your Teaching Website
Platform Comparison: WordPress, Patreon, & Udemy
Booking & Content Access Tools
Gear & Studio Setup
Talking On Camera
All Things Green Screen
Quick Editing & Export for Web
In-Person vs. Virtual Formats
Efficient Content Reuse
Assigning Practice & Homework
Improving Teaching Away From Lessons
Teaching Different Skill Levels
Local Outreach & Flyer Design
Online Promotion: YouTube, Social Media & Your Email List
SEO for Your Business
Teaching Philosophy & Student Connection
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