The School of Feedback Guitar Blog

I have had a lot on my mind lately. I have been doing some heavy-duty thinking about the situations that people learn in. In my view, if I were to choose the best situation to learn in, the one where my world doesn't have to be crushed in order to learn, I'll learn fast and effortlessly. I have often seen people get frustrated from being in situations that aren't so good, but for some reason or another did not quit them. I have been pondering an idea about why people choose to learn from unhealthy teachers or in terrible circumstances, and I am hoping this post can inspire some community participation. If learning in a good situation means a person would learn more, then why choose to stay in a bad one? 

To give an example of a bad learning situation, perhaps there is a teacher who is extremely brutal but has a reasonably solid reputation. I have known quite a few music teachers who were extremely unforgiving, both to me and anyone else who had learned from them. But we kept at it anyway. Why did we do it? I think that I learned from bad teachers because I didn't have a choice. I think that I wasn't convinced of any other teacher's ability, and because my mind was so wrapped up in how to remain unscathed I never sought out a better one. When I figured out that there are better teachers out there, I gravitated to them. I eventually opened up, and I learned more.

Good teachers relate to their students on a human level, heart-to-heart. They inherently understand what it means to make each challenge beat-able, and to time their presentation of certain material only when the student is ready. Good teachers make the entire process extremely smooth, and are constantly learning how to be a better teacher.

Bad teachers will spin students up so much that they cannot fathom another way to learn, or that there is a better teacher to learn from. The students do not develop a good healthy interdependency with their teacher, and they certainly do not become more free-thinking. To me, the scraps of knowledge the teacher doles out is devoid of the heart that good teachers are known for. Good teachers not only fill in the blanks for what the student is learning, but they also present it with heart.

Breaking free from a bad learning situation is neither enjoyable or fun. A person really needs a lot of courage. Teachers are authority figures, and (scary as it seems) they have the option of applying pressure to the areas that we have exposed as the most vulnerable when we started with them. Bad teachers will use their student's vulnerabilities to their advantage. They will make it seem like students would be fools to leave their "expert" tutelage. The hardest part for the person who is thinking of quitting a bad teacher or learning situation is having the courage to face the inevitable isolation, afterwords. Not easy. Freedom, it would seem, is not always easy to bear. 

Many students think that they have to deal with abusive teachers, teachers who break them down, in order to learn. My two cents: Screw that. 

Since this is more of an opinion piece, I would be grateful for any feedback if you would like to share. 

I will not apologize.

No student ever needs to have his or her own sovereignty obliterated in order to learn. None. End of discussion. No teacher should think it's his or her own job to break the student down and then build them up from there. 

I remember the teachers who listened to me, who actually cared to know how I was doing, who offered a helping hand and good guidance. These are the teachers I'll never forget. They are the supermans, the superwomans of education. They put up with a whole mess-o-crap in order to teach. They have to do thousands of things outside of the actual educational process. They need to be absolutely on top of it all in order to help out scores of people and handle multiple tasks at one time. It's a hard, heavy, task. I know. I'm a teacher, too.

Some teachers handle that weight by being incredibly brutal to their students. Some teachers stop caring and they collect a check. What about the teachers we remember? These teachers followed a process of encouraging their students think the way that's best for them. In my opinion, a dedicated minority of teachers respect and encourage the sovereignty of their students. When you teach anyone else any subject or skill, you are helping another person who has opened up and admitted that they are weak in an area that you are strong in. How are you going to do it? Are you going to be brutal and make it hard on them to learn, or will you really challenge them by respecting their autonomy as well as your own? 

Knowing how to teach something is fun, but there's more to it than simply filling in the blanks.

I'll admit it: I love learning more than I love teaching. Don't get me wrong; Teaching is a good way to go about my days and I do enjoy it. However, I gaze in wonder of all that I have learned about guitar, music, life, art, people, and I realize that it's just a drop in the bucket of all I can do. I won't stop learning as long as I am alive because it just feels so good. It's been less important to me to make the rent (sometimes) than it has to make sure I'm learning something new. This is why it's such a natural fit for me to teach. I like learning, and what better way to learn than help a bunch of other people learn? Part of teaching, for me, is how to present concepts in such a way that saves someone five years of running around in circles. Learning how to do this requires quite a bit of my energy, but I enjoy it. It's a worthy goal to be user-friendly. As a martial arts instructor once told me, "If I don't make you better than I am, then I'm not doing my job right."

I am wondering if I will think of 2010, and the years surrounding it, as the golden age of user-friendly design. I won't go so far as to repeat what's already been said about how awesome Apple is doing when compared to other computing companies, but I will say that their example is extremely inspiring. What better example exists of a computing experience? Who better defines ease of use? What better example allows the user more depth if they want it, and what better example is there of a well-designed atmosphere that allows users to ignore the depth? These are important points.

Depth and Simplicity

I don't mind being the only guitar teacher in Austin who is taking user-experience seriously. It seems to work okay for me (check out my schedule). The trick with my work has been how to synthesize every single aspect of learning guitar from scratch into a beautiful user experience. For example, not every single person I've taught wants to learn music theory, but it's available for anyone who is looking for it. I like this approach. The user experience is such that it doesn't automatically include theory, but allows an in-depth review if anyone wants to check it out. Having the option doesn't mean utilizing it. Options are our green light for more depth if we choose it, but are also the gates keeping us from needlessly complicating things.

Perhaps we are in an age now where we are just expecting more services, products, and designs to be simpler and clearer. Perhaps we are starting to demand a better designed information architecture. I love to pick on guitar teachers for this: Do we really need to teach scales if all our students are interested in learning is how to strum along to Beatles songs? No, we don't. Nor do we need to learn how to program in C to know how to use an iPhone! It's all about depth if you want it, and simplicity in it's initial presentation and use.

There is a cliche in the music education world. It's usually said this way: "(name of guitar teacher) can play, but he/she can't teach!" Sometimes we even, unneccesarily, poke fun of music teachers by saying, "(name of guitar teacher) is not a performer; He/She is a teacher, obviously." At the center of these statements lies a crucial ambivalence facing the work of any guitar teacher:

Guitar teachers are paid to teach, and performers are paid to escape.

The best performers are the people who "have it." These are the ones who make a show so fun and enjoyable, so great and awesome, that we can't help but forget all of our problems and cheer them on. We as the audience want to see the performer escape so that we can escape with them. It's like seeing a show and thinking at the end of it, "I wish they would play another song!" Performers inherently know this; The stage is where time doesn't exist. Performers are often as irresponsible, impulsive, and immature as one will see. Drugs? Alcohol? Addiction? Stupid behavior? You name it. When one is paid to escape, when one is cheered on to take the audience to another level and help them forget about their problems, you can bet that it translates to many other areas of their life. To performers, responsibility might often seem like a drag. It seems far more exciting to trash a hotel room. For them it's more fun to just be out of control, like how it is on stage.

Many would-be performers are initially drawn to teaching at first. Why not? So many people are looking to play music that it seems like a logical stepping stone to being a rock star. The operative words are "stepping-stone." Are they there to teach, or are they seeking an audience? If I were looking for a guitar teacher, they would need to convince me that I was the center of their attention, and that they are going to do their best to create a space for me to learn. They would need to convince me that they are there for me. I will not say that all performers are like this, but many are unable to teach because, again, responsibility is a drag.

Guitar teachers are paid to teach, and teaching requires developing responsibility. If you want to perform for a living and teach too, the real trick is how to balance the both of them.

Teachers have a much harder job than most people realize. A short list of their responsibilities:

1. Teaching students.
2. Creating and/or maintaining curriculum.
3. Maintaining good relations with the administration.

Each of these tasks could potentially lead to the dreaded world of burnout, the place teachers go when they give up and collect a check. The less a teacher has to deal with administration, the fewer but more concentrated the student body they are in charge of, the better. Most teachers are not afforded these luxuries. Burnout is a tough thing to contend with, and if the teacher is not in the right frame of mine it will happen. Vitality can dissapear, and for more reasons than the above.

This is one of the reasons I am extremely tough on (admittedly well-meaning) guitarists who wish to moonlight as guitar teachers. When they send me their resumes, I look hard at them and see if they truly want to do this. I tend to be careful because not everyone wants to teach. Many guitar teachers aspire to play in front of 10,000 screaming fans. It was the reason I started playing guitar! However, Nicholas Goluses, the Professor of Classical Guitar at the Eastman School of Music, contends that no guitarist can be a stellar performer without also being a stellar teacher. Nicholas, by-the-way, learned from Manuel Barruecco, a guy who definitely knows a thing or two about teaching and performing guitar.

Burnout is a tough thing, but guitar teachers have it easier than other teachers. There are about a thousand different styles of guitar to learn, millions of people to learn from and teach, and the amount of music created with a guitar is astounding. Burnout is the enemy, vitality is the goal. Your students want that just as much as they want to learn guitar, so how are you going to remain vital to them, year after year? It's a good question to ask yourself.

Forgive me, I've been on a kick about teaching philosophy lately. Yesterday I was telling someone that very few things in my life have inspired more growth than teaching guitar for a living. It's true. It takes a lot of energy to grow while making a space for others. All teachers are confronted with the issue of energy conservation when they open up their door to helping others learn. A really good point to remember, if a person wants to make space for others to learn, is learn how not to be a pushover.

I am pretty convinced that some guitar teachers are there to support a student at any cost. They are there to help them and see them do well. This is great, but it is a double edged sword. By being too open there is the danger of allowing personal and professional boundaries to break down between the two parties. Maintaining boundaries, while being a kind person, is a hard but necessary act for both persons. An example from my guitar education work is this: I am pretty strict about making sure that each lesson starts at the top of the hour and not a minute before. I usually have about five minutes to myself between two adjacent lessons. Those five minutes are precious to me; I use them to group my thoughts, create lesson plans, and keep on top of what I need to do. So therefore, I will ask the next student if I may have a couple more minutes before beginning their lesson if they are a bit early. There's nothing wrong with being eager to learn! I like that people show up early. But stating I need more time means that I am very kind to both of us. After I am ready, it's on to rock and roll, and I am better able to make a space for them and their needs. There is an art to maintaining personal boundaries while being a decent person.

Giving and teaching with kindness does not mean allowing everyone to trample all over your personal needs. I believe it is possible to do that while still drawing lines of what is acceptable and unacceptable. It's true that some people need a bit of guidance on how you want the relationship to work. They need boundaries to be set so that everyone's safety can be established. The sooner the boundaries are respected and maintained, the sooner the work blossoms. It's pretty awe-inspiring to watch this happen in realtime, too.

I am aware of how incredibly cliche this will sound, but I'm going to say it none-the-less: The most satisfying ingredient to use as a teacher is an open heart.

Think back for a moment to all the teachers you have had in your life. I bet you can name the ones that really took an interest in you. What did they do to inspire you? What kind of persons were they? How did act around you? Did they have a complete mastery over the subject matter? What convinced you that they really wanted to see you do well?

I've had tons of teachers over the years, just like most of us. Somehow, I had only two teachers in grade school who really truly inspired me to learn and explore music. I remember these two teachers so well not just because of their breadth of knowledge, which was incredibly staggering. I remembered them simply because of their kindness. To be kind to others it takes a good and open heart.

As cliche as it sounds, having an open heart is the key to teaching.

The teachers who inspired us figured out how to teach with such a good heart that we couldn't help but give ours back. Simply, good teachers know how to give their heart away and inspire the student, and they know how to do that in a professional way. Being around teachers of this caliber who have been willing to share what they know is inspiring to say the least. It's not just what people know (which again, can be absolutely staggering), but it's the kind and open hearted way that they share it.

The act of sharing what you know with another person is one of the most incredibly beautiful things you can do. All a person really has to give is their time and energy. Both of these resources are so precious that truly giving them to another, with sincerity, can be problematic at times. However, the journey of learning to teach with an open heart is worth it, no matter the difficulties.

Teaching is fun because I learn just as much, if not more, than the student I am helping. It's true. I guess this is the sort of learning that can't be done in a classroom, as I am learning more about people in general. Through years of building my school, I finally figured out that I learn the most from being present in that moment, even if it's hard. That might not always be very fun, but it is neccesary. The student appreciates it none-the-less.

I have this personal enemy that I like to call The Autopilot Mode. Autopilot Mode is what happens where I am only concerned with getting the student to learn something about the guitar or music. There is something deeply wrong with approaching lessons with the notion that the teacher loads the student up with information. There is potential for so much more for both! Like many musicians say, there is more to music than the dots on the page.

Every person out there wants someone to relate to. It's part of who we are and it's part of what makes us human. By staying present regardless of what is going on, a teacher will more often than not find that the student stays present as well. It's an odd thing, but the less of an autopilot I am, then the more enjoyable time it is, for both.

I remember a long time ago when a teacher I highly respected, and feared, called me out during class. "Dave, you are going to hate me now, but in 20 years you might thank me. Spell me a fully altered scale starting on A flat." This was in front of all of my friends. I didn't appreciate it.

This teacher was challenging me, and his point was not to embarass me, even though he did. His point was: "Be equal." He wanted me to truly know and understand music theory, and he challenged me to be thoughtful about it.

10 years later, I realize that that SOB was right. I laughed out loud, hard.

Although I would not do something like that to anyone, there is something to the idea of being challenging. For many years, I felt it was the teacher's responcibility to make every challenge beatable. Now, I think that there might be room for being a bit more of an agitator. I'm thinking (and writing) out loud. Why can't a teacher do everything in their power to foster a healthy professional relationship first, and then start to challenge the student later? I'm sure this sound strange, but why not agitate a student to do better after both parties are secure in that professional relationship? If the student doesn't take responcibility for getting better, then who does? After all, the teacher's true goal is to teach their student so well that they don't need them as a teacher anymore, right? Many many thoughts are on my mind right now. I'm not going to be a jerk to anyone if I can help it, but I think this is the next thing to ponder as a teacher. More to follow.