Organising your lesson materials and having a practice schedule to help you stay accountable and consistent is super important If you want to progress and enjoy the guitar.
To help you get started and ready for your lessons with me, set up a learning folder as shown below.
Your Guitar Folder
You’re going to need a guitar folder with a bunch of separate sections to keep all of your notes in. You can do this any way you want. Some people use an arch folder with polly-pockets. Others are able to find a folder with built-in sections. Both work really well.
Labelling Your Guitar Folder
Once you’ve got a folder with separate sections you then need to label 9 core sections as so:
- Practice Schedule
- Spark List
- Yearly Tracker
- Lesson Notes
- Songs/Music
- Techniques
- Fretboard Knowledge
- Practice Strategies
- Music Theory
Understanding The Sections
The Practice Schedule is where you’ll keep all of your practice schedules. The current practice schedule is always at the front.
The Spark List is where you’ll keep a record of all the songs, solos, riffs and anything else music-related that inspires you. If you’re having lessons in person, I’ll provide these sheets for you.
The Yearly Tracker is a Birdseye view of your practice sessions over the course of a year.
Lesson Notes is where you’ll keep a one-page note of everything you’ve learnt in a specific lesson.
The Songs/Music section needs to be sub-sectioned, but we don’t need to do this right away. This is where you’ll keep materials relating to songs, solos, riffs etc.
Techniques are where you’ll keep all of your notes relating to guitar techniques such as hammer-ons, pull-offs and string bending etc.
The Fretboard Knowledge section needs to be sub-sectioned but we don’t need to do this right away. This is where you’ll keep all of your notes relating to the fretboard such as chords, scales, arpeggios, intervals, and note names.
Practice Strategies are where you keep any materials relating to better ways of learning and practising the guitar. These will come up from time to time in your lessons when relevant.
Music Theory is where you’ll keep all of your notes on music theory.
Download Sections
After labelling each section, if you’re having lessons online you’ll then need to download and print out a Practice Schedule, a Spark List, a Chord Box sheet and a Yearly Tracker here, and then place each sheet in the relevant section in your folder.
Extra Sections
Over time, your guitar folder will grow and evolve and take on even more sections depending on which direction you’d like to take your guitar journey. So keep extra sections on standby.
Digital Folders
If you’re more of a digital type of person, you can create a digital folder rather than a paper version. A couple of my students use the free version of Notion (app) to do this, and they look great.