First off, let me say that the expression “guitar lessons for children” is a bit of a misnomer Music is music, it doesn’t matter if it’s an adult playing it or a child, the music lessons are all indistinguishable .

In this article, I will provide the justification for the aforementioned statements. When contemplating guitar lessons for children, I think we can all agree that children for many reasons are not the same as adults.

In the case of guitar lessons there are two characteristics that are most important, they are:

Small Hands
Short Attention Span

Physical Differencess
You already know this, but every part of a child’s body is smaller than an adult’s I remember when I was a child, I thought my parents were huge. Especially my father. He’s all of 5’8″, but I remember looking at his shoes in his closet thinking, “I’ll never be that big”.

When I was a kid, my Uncle Bob gave me a guitar that he bought at a garage sale. To my utter disappointment, my hands just weren’t big enough to play the thing.

Child’s Guitars

Back when I first picked up a guitar, I had no idea that the people that make guitars also manufacture them for little people too (I hope that was politically correct).

If you think you might be interested in getting guitar lessons for children, make plans first to get a guitar that is smaller than what a grownup would play. Finding the right guitar is so critical to your child’s success that I cannot stress this point enough.

Here’s an incredible video of and eight year old playing on stage. This should get your kids juices flowing. Even from a distance you can tell that his guitar is a little smaller than the other ones.

 

New Child’s Guitars

Try to avoid buying a new child’s guitar. Shifty store owners or salesmen know that buying anything for your child is an emotional purchase. They could try to get as much mulah as possible from you because they know you may be willing to spend a lot to make your kid happy. If you live in or near a big city, there is probably a used instrument shop around. They deal mostly in school band instruments, but you might get lucky and find what you’re looking for. One advantage of getting a used guitar is that you’re not taking a big hit on depreciation like the first owner did.

Inexpensive Guitars

Now don’t get me wrong, I should also say, “Don’t go cheapo”. Relatively inexpensive guitars are fairly plentiful and easy to find. Try to resist the urge to pick one up. The reason that inexpensive guitars are bad for students is because they are built with compromises. Usually they are built with the strings too far from the neck. This is done so that the neck can warp and the guitar can still be played, but the student will have great difficulty playing it. I’ve had friends that bought cheap guitars, but in every case that I can think of, they either ended up buying a better guitar or they stopped playing altogether.

Short Attention Span

Before buying guitar lessons for children, the other important thing to think about is that children almost always have a short attention span.

Of course, I didn’t think I had a short attention span when I was a kid. Everyone probably thinks that way. I guess it’s only natural that I didn’t think I had a short attention span, but I do remember when one of my teenage sons took the lawnmower apart so he could rebuild it, only he never put it back together because he went on to another project. I just took it for granted that once a project got started, it probably wouldn’t get finished.

Distractions

When all four of my children expressed a desire to play guitar, my first thought was, “here we go again”.

There are just too many distractions for a teenager. With all the distractions, none of my kids got beyond the talking stage when it came to guitar lessons for children. Then, to my surprise, one of my boys started playing guitar when he was a senior in high school. He didn’t want to take lessons though. He said his friends would teach him. It was a social thing I guess.

“Wow”, I thought, that’s a very adult type commitment and ten years later he still plays.

You have the guitar, you have your kids short attention span in mind, you just need the guitar lessons for children. You’ll find that the short attention span is the number one consideration when looking for lessons.

The Actual Lessons

In the old days, (I consider anything before the internet to be the old days) you had to either join the school band or talk your parents into getting a private music instructor for you.

The private music instructors pretty much had the market to themselves, but with a computer in every house, it’s not that way anymore. While you’re surfing around on your computer, you’ll notice at least two types of sites where you can get your guitar lessons for children. One type has lessons that are actually prerecorded videos. You pay a one time fee and then watch the videos anytime you want. With the other type of site, you pay a small fee every month and then receive so many lessons per month. You won’t get a refund if you don’t use the lessons.

The Best Choice

When you think about the short attention span, paying a one time fee for your guitar lessons for children sounds like the way to go. With the best of intentions, your kid will complete each lesson. Things may be going just fine when your child falls victim to what I call, “shiny object syndrome”, in other words, something else looks interesting or they just might want to take some time off for awhile. Believe me, I saw that with my own kids. They were always jumping to another activity before finishing the first one.

A personal instructor is trying to pay his bills so he wouldn’t be very happy about his student dropping guitar in favor of something else. A personal instructor would most likely try to talk your child into keeping the guitar lessons for children continuing.

It also doesn’t work out to “take a break” with a membership site, where you’ll have to pay whether you use the lessons or not.

What Have We Learned?

With a little bit of planning, you and your kid can be well prepared by the time you go shopping for guitar lessons for children. Take a child’s size and mental differences into account before making any decisions. I personally believe that your best bet when buying guitar lessons for children would be a fixed price site, where you pay a one time fee and then your child could watch the video lessons any time they feel like it.

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About the Author:
I live in a suburb of Olympia, Wa. and have playing guitar since my college days in 1970. Besides playing guitar I also enjoy writing about it. I’m hoping that some of my enthusiasm will rub off on some of my kids’s friends.To read more about guitar lessons for children, check out this Squidoo lens.
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