learning routine, Am I doing it right?

Hello,

I am hoping to get some feedback on if I am doing the fundamental lessons correctly. This is my second attempt at learning the Guitar. On My first attempt I would watch the lessons in fundamental part 1 and would not move on to the next lesson until I could do what was being taught. Eventually I Just stopped progressing and gave it up. I think I just lost interest.

 Now a year later here I am on the second attempt. This time I have the attitude of watching the lesson and learning the chord or strumming pattern and then moving on to the next lesson...Even though I haven't reached a level of being completely proficient in what I learned....Now,  Ive been at it for about 6 weeks (20-30min a day) and am almost halfway through fundamental part 2 ....I cant help but wonder if I am doing it wrong or differently from everyone else? I feel like I am making progress and I am excited to watch and learn from the next lesson but a side effect of just watching and moving on is I cant recall the names of all of the chords that I am fretting. 

I would love to here what you all think and please share your learning routines.

Tom R,

Santa Barbara CA

Hello

Sounds like your 2nd attempt is probably going to be more productive. Staying on a lesson until perfected can get boring and pull the fun out of learning guitar. However, we do need to go back to lessons that we had only partially mastered at some point and move further down the road with them. 

I don't see you mention songs. I would not put off learning songs. In the song catalog there are various sections from Absolute Beginner to Advanced, it might help to have a look at finding something that you can commit to just so you get a song under your belt.

good luck

Bill

Thanks to William for a great reply as usual.

Tom, what you are describing is a typical learning experience.  You are doing fine.  Keep practicing some every day.  Don't worry about getting it perfect.  Keep moving forward to learn new ideas & skills.  Make time to keep reviewing old material to gradually improve.

Learning guitar is a constant process of gradual refinement.

The good thing about the fundamentals courses is that there are training song structures.  But you should definitely add in learning some songs that you know and enjoy to keep you motivated.  After all that's why we learn all the skills & ideas: to apply them to playing songs we love.

The landing page of the Fundamentals courses have songs linked in between the chapters.

https://www.guitartricks.com/course/fundamentals2

And the made easy songs collection is a great place to look for songs at beginner skill level.

https://www.guitartricks.com/songs/beginner

Hope that helps!

Alright,

Thanks for the encouragement. I will keep moving forward through the fundamental tutorials... and learn a song that gets my foot tapping.

I honestly thought I needed to finish the fundamentals before I should learn a song. Kind of like eating your vegetables first before enjoying the main course or dessert.

I Sure appreciate the input.

Tom R

Good luck Tom

Bill

Stick with it Tom! It’s all a matter of putting in the time and celebrating even the smallest wins! Remember to be patient with yourself. The gift of being able to play at any level is so worth it. You know the old saying: If it was easy everyone would do it!

Best of luck and remember to use the forum for questions. The instructors care and are top notch as you can see by Christophers response. 

Hi,

i was wondering if you guys have a suggestion for practice routine. I dont know if you are familiar with justing guitar but he typically offers a structured path and when it is ok to move on. For example if you can do certain number of chord changes in one minute etc. i was wondering if there are benchmarks previously recommended by the instructors for these lessons. I really like guitar tricks and the lessons, i just feel stuck and demotivated because im not sure when to move on. Or how frequently i should practice lets say C major extended scale or until what point i should keep practicing it. I would really appreciate any help. Thank you

I missed this earlier!

The benchmark for any given lesson is that you are done with it when you completely understand the idea being taught and, or can do the physical skill being taught.  But that doesn't mean you should be able to play it perfectly every time going forward.  You want to get the basic idea & be able to put the skill (chord, chord change, strumming rhythm, scale pattern, whatever it is) in your practice routine.  You want to have a decent grasp of it, understand how to keep practicing it & how to refine it.  Then go forward in the course your are working on.

You want to keep moving forward to keep improving & stay motivated, but not so much that you get overwhelmed & in over your head, then discouraged.  Learning guitar is a constant process of repetition & refinement.  For as long as you play you'll keep playing many of the same things over & again to keep them under your fingers while you gradually add new skills & improve your old skills.

Knowing how much & when to review is a very individual thing.  It depends on your skill level, what you are working on & how much time you have in your daily practice schedule.  If you have a specific question about any given lesson, please ask.

A standard practice session should start with warming up with something fun & relatively easy.  Then gradually move into something new & challenging.   Then eventually finish with something that is again fun & easy.

You specifically mention the extended C major scale.  I'm guessing you are in Fundamentals 1 on chapter 3.  As an example, if you have an hour to practice, then I would recommend:

Start by getting warmed up playing a song from earlier in the course that includes some chords & strumming you are already familiar with.  This gets you playing with something fun & relatively easy.  Then you can try some newer chords or strumming.  Then spend time working on that scale.  Picking individual notes is a challenging new skill if you've only previously worked on strumming chords.  Then go back to some chord strumming song that's easy to end the session in a satisfying way.

The number of repetitions of any given skill is going to vary by individual.  There is no specific number that works the same for everyone.  We all have to do the same thing: practice it until it's right and sounds like music.  It takes as long as takes.  So we try to enjoy the process!

Hope that helps. Keep practicing!

Thank you!

You're welcome!