Teaching guitar to young children in a social group setting is an ideal way to introduce them to the instrument. Some time ago I set up the Gold Coast Kids' Guitar Club. This was aimed at teaching young children from 5 years of age en masse how to play guitar and read music in a social and fun setting. The kids enjoy the friendships they've made and over time they've bonded as a team and look forward to their weekly Saturday morning Guitar Club. Some have been with the club for a number of years and are now completing Classical Guitar exams.
Running the club weekly, it dawned on me that I had been ignoring a potentially valuable resource - the parents! Parents would come and go. They might do the weekly grocery shopping or stay and read the paper or study their phones. One day I decided to introduce Parents Day, just for a bit of fun. This was the day that parents could sit and learn with their children. Well, it was a blast. The kids loved the fact that they knew more than their parents, could teach them a thing or two enjoyed showing them what they were doing wrong! Besides the confidence boost it gave the kids, there were other benefits to having the parents in the class. Parents now had a much better idea of what their children should be practicing, kids and parents were bonding by playing guitar together and the adult presence in the class became a stabilising influence on rambunctious behaviour.
Music Educator, Composer and Guitarist, Bryce Leader, holds a Bachelor of Music Education degree and an A(Mus)A in Classical Guitar. He has been a classroom music teacher and guitar teacher for over thirty years and performs regularly in classical, jazz, rock and country music contexts.