NO CHORDS BARRED #7 – Looking Back

My last guitar lesson of the year is on Tuesday. Looking back on the three and a half months I feel like I’ve made some real progress. It’s a lot like trying to lose weight. You start exercising and watching what you eat and it’s hard and it’s frustrating. The worst part is you don’t notice any changes at first. For a long while it feels like you must be doing something wrong. It’s only after a couple of months when you compare where you are now to where you began that you really see the differences.

One big improvement is that I use a pick now. Before I only used my fingers to strum because it was quieter (I had roommates and thin walls on my first attempt to learn guitar). It also covered up a lot of sloppiness. Using a pick makes the chords so much crisper and isn’t as forgiving so it forces me to practice technique. Another sign of progress has been incorporating a new finger formation for the G chord into my repertoire. I still prefer the old way but it is coming along and I do use it when it is clearly the better way to change to or from a G. The most obvious measure of learning is that I can play a few simple songs well enough to try fooling around with other people. That’s something I want to do in the new year. So far the only other person I’ve played with has been my teacher. It’s time to start including some peer instruction. Overall, I feel more confident picking up the guitar. Sometimes when I’m on a particularly good roll it’s like I’m a real guitar player.

My students had their last class on Friday. I hope they can also look back and see their own progress. I certainly can. I like to point out to my chemistry students when they begin to start talking about chemistry casually and conversationally. Things like, “How many electrons does Oxygen need [to fill its valence shell]?” and someone replies, “2” without batting an eye. In late August no one would have understood the question let alone the answer. I also see differences in my Science classes. For example, one student used to snack on cookies and candy throughout the day and then switched to fruit after completing her “Healthy Change” project. A small thing like that speaks volumes as to what she learned about health and nutrition and it has nothing to do with a mark, it’s a personal change.

The semester is over and now I’m starting to think about January. I hope my students and I will be able to look back on the journey from here to June and see growth and improvement again.

NO CHORDS BARRED #6 – “The Promises Our Teachers Gave, If We Worked Hard, If We Behaved”

My teacher was excited when I suggested learning a song. I think he was hoping I would ask.  After discussing the possibility with him I went home and spent the week trying to decide what to pick. I narrowed it down to four choices and brought them in. In the end we went with Billy Joel’s “Allentown” since he knew that song best. (The others were “Althea” by the Grateful Dead, Bruce Springsteen’s “Atlantic City” and “Ginseng Sullivan” by Norman Blake). I had just watched “The Hangover 2” the weekend before and Ed Helms plays an acoustic version of “Allentown” in the movie. I’ve always liked the song so I looked up the chords and printed it out.

For the past couple of weeks I’ve been working on it. Some parts come easy. The opening line, “Well we’re living here in Allentown…” Is just Em, A, D, relatively simple chords. So naturally I play that part and other easy sections over and over again. It is so satisfying to hear familiar music and know that you are making it. I’m sure there are endorphins released. However, this is a problem. I see it in my classroom as well. Project Based Learning is large in scope and multifaceted by its nature. Some parts come easy to the student whether it’s because of prior knowledge or high interest. There are always some things in the beginning that students eat up. The problem is the hard part that comes after that: the tedious stuff like referencing, the boring stuff like correcting mistakes, the time it takes to dig deeper.

So now I’m practicing the hard parts I can’t do. Zero endorphins released. It’s repetitive and frustrating. I’m tempted to just play and sing the verses I can for an hour and call that practice. The non-cognitive skill I am very aware of at the moment is discipline. Discipline is high up on my list. I ask my students to show discipline in their dedication to the program and the quality of their work. Of course it’s hard. Of course it’s no fun. (I’m not a rote method teacher but there are things such as balancing chemical equations that you just need to practice to get good at.) Regardless of talent or skill, discipline increases your chances of success.

I feel like it is going to take a long time to get the entire song down. There’s some fast strumming and switching between F and G in the, “Every child had a pretty good shot…” part. I can’t even play it slowly. There’s also the end of verse section, “and it’s getting very hard to staaaay…” that involves several chords and is tricky strumming. I’ve been trying to be disciplined and practice just those sections over and over again. Because it’s hard I also find I’m slipping back into making my G’s the way I used to when I first learned guitar. My teacher asked my on my first lesson to try forming G with a different fingering. When a song gets hard I subconsciously switch back. This adds another layer of complication since I can sometimes solve my switching chords problem but cheating on how I form the G. All of this points to the simple truth that practice makes perfect, and practice requires discipline.

P.S.  On another note the, choice of “Allentown” for this project is somewhat ironic. The lyrics of the second verse are not kind to education. “The promises out teachers gave, if we worked hard, if we behaved. So the graduations hang on the wall, but they never really helped us at all, no they never taught us what was real; iron, coke, chromium, steel.” It’s a cautionary reminder to me about what a student should leave school with. I make those promises. Adult high school students (and some administrators and teachers for that matter) sometimes mistake the piece of paper that is the diploma for the goal. It’s true, owning that piece of paper opens some doors but it’s useless if you don’t know how to walk through them.

NO CHORDS BARRED #5 – Fear of Freedom

I need a project. I have been practicing the basics and learning theory (more than I thought) for almost 2 months now and I feel like it’s time to start applying that to a more holistic guitar education experience, namely I’d like to learn to play a simple song. I still want to go in the direction my teacher is taking me but I’d like to work on something that puts it all together.

I’m a big fan of project-based learning. It is student driven and personal.  I give lots of choice and encourage students to think about their interests and goals in both the topic they choose and how they want to present their learning. In my Science class I’m trying to create an environment as close to an emergent curriculum as I can within the confines of the learning outcomes and available resources. This necessarily means I step back and put the student in the driver’s seat. It’s freedom. Freedom to explore, freedom to create, freedom to connect.  Unfortunately, the reality is that often students act like the animal that stays in its cage after the zookeeper has forgotten to close the door. It frustrates me and I want to say, “Run!”

That’s why my own reaction to the thought of a “guitar project” is so surprising to me. After realizing that practicing a real song is what I need to do, my first inclination was to ask my teacher to pick one for me. I started making excuses to myself as to why it would be better for him to pick it; “He can judge my abilities better than I can and therefore pick a song of appropriate skill level”, “I don’t know what I don’t know”, “There are probably ‘good’ songs to begin with”, etc, etc… I’m sure these are all good points but they start to look like the bars on my own zoo cage. The door is open, the bars don’t matter. It’s just a stupid song but my fears and insecurities are keeping me from taking control of my own learning. I don’t want to be judged for my choice or musical taste. I don’t want to have an awkward conversation about why it’s not a good song and I don’t want to find out in a month that I’ve bitten off more than I can chew. These thoughts seduce me into preferring the comforts of my pen.

When I go to my lesson on Tuesday I’m going to present this idea to my teacher. Maybe I’m not ready and I will respect his judgement and expertise. If this is something we can agree on then it is up to me to choose. I will want my teacher’s feedback but I need to lead. In my own classroom I need to be more mindful of the bars my students see when I present them with their freedom.