These two lesson plans were made prior to the lessons that they correspond to, lesson plan 1 was made before our first lesson together and lesson plan two was made after our first lesson but before the second one. This means that these two lessons and all the other lessons that we had didn’t necessarily follow the plan exactly, however the plans acted as an aid to keep the lessons on track and ensure progress was being made. 

In the first lesson plan I state that I would like to teach Art a one octave C major scale, however he already knew how to do this. As a drummer, Art’s knowledge of melodic and harmonic music theory is not as advanced as his level of technical facility on the bass guitar therefore we spent the majority of this lesson understanding the fretboard and applying it to what he could already play. To do this I had Art play the scale on different positions on the fretboard and I had him sing and say the note names out loud as he played them, singing is an important skill as a musician and an ‘inescapable component of music training’ (Pomerleau-Turcotte et al., 2023). This helps students to begin to understand their instrument in relation to their wider understanding of music, I wanted Art to know what notes he was playing, not just remember the shapes and patterns on the instrument. The extension exercise that I wanted to go through with Art was to learn a song from the grade 3 Bass Guitar Rockshool book however after the beginning of our lesson I quickly realised that this would have been too basic for Art’s playing level. This meant that we were able to use our first lesson to talk about what he wanted from these lessons in general, what he would like to learn and what music he likes. I used the time to teach Art some techniques that would help his theory knowledge to catch up to his skill on the instrument. I tasked him with playing through all the scales that he knew (these were natural major and minor shapes as well as the minor pentatonic) and say the notes out loud and to work out the key centre and key signature of them. We did a few of these together, for example, pick a note on the E string and play a minor pentatonic; this could be B minor. Play the B minor pentatonic scale and say the notes outload. I successfully gained an understanding of his current ability on the instrument and Art learned something new and learned a way to improve on his own. All aims were met in this first lesson however, in hindsight, I realised that I had planned the lesson for someone of a lower ability than my student. This meant that I had to think on the spot which in this case worked adequately, although it would have been better if I had been able to tailor the plan to my student better. Throughout this lesson I was trying to be acitively aware of how Art responds to different learning styles, this is important as recognising students learning styles can make it easier for teachers to determine what learning strategies and methods to use when teaching’ (Zahra, 2024, Abstract). I found that he responds best to watching and hearing me play something, and then doing it himself. This mixture of learning types when put in the following order: visual, auditory, kinesthetic, was very effective.

This brings me on to lesson plan 2, this was created after our first lesson therefore it was more tailored to the student as we had spent some time getting to know each other, allowing me as the teacher to understand what my student wanted to learn and what would benefit his musical progression. My aims for the lesson were to look at a song together and to teach Art how to play a major scale across two octaves. In the clip below you can see us working through some questions that Art had about a song he had been learning; we used this as a warmup before the lesson activities started, to have some fun playing before actively learning new things. He wanted some help with how to play octaves at slightly faster tempos than he was used to- this is an intermediate right-hand technique that involves skipping strings, it takes some significant practice to train your fingers to move in a way that they aren’t used to.

This clip begins with Art demonstrating a bass line that he has been working on; he was having trouble with getting the octaves up to speed. I explained some exercises that he can use for getting his octaves to sound clean, precise, and eventually faster. We broke the bassline down and played the more challenging part at a much slower tempo allowing Art to get used to this new technique and train his fingers to become more comfortable. New techniques can feel uncomfortable under the fingers and expose things that you may have never thought about before. On the bass guitar different players approach different techniques in many ways, this is because everyone’s hands are different and everyone has different strengths, due to this, I told Art that when he is at home practicing, he should try different ways of playing these techniques to discover what works best for him. When reflecting on my teaching in this clip I realise that I could have been more articulate in my explanation of the concepts and techniques; it would have been beneficial to summarise the practice techniques that we went through before moving on. 

After this we moved on to the main activities of the lesson and Art successfully learned how to play a 2 octave C major scale. This is demonstrated in the clip below, I also explained to art the importance of using a strap when practicing for his posture and comfort, while he was sorting out his strap we had a brief conversation about his knowledge of harmony. I used this is a form of inadvertent formative assessment to understand in greater detail what information to teach Art in future lessons. 

Art picked this up quickly and I made sure to tell him that he played it very well as ‘motivation results in high quality learning and creativity’ (Ryan and Deci, 2000, p55). This was all completed before the end of the lesson so, as I wanted these lessons to be student led, I asked Art if he would like to learn another scale before we finished, beginning the extension exercise of looking at modes. He expressed clear interest in this and requested that we worked on it in the next lesson, and he instead wanted me to look at his slap bass technique quickly, this is shown in the next clip. 

I was very impressed with Art’s technique and told him that he was doing everything correctly, he had some doubts about the way he was “plucking” the string, but I assured him that everything he was doing was correct. This is a brilliant example of how reassurance and praise can help with self-confidence on the instrument as “talent is not inborn” but cultivated through environment encouragement and practice (Sanchez, 2024). Art felt his technique may have been incorrect which was affecting his confidence when playing the bass, however after this session he realised that his approach was correct, but he still needed to practice. After this we had a quick recap of the lesson as we went through a large amount of new material. I asked Art to demonstrate the two-octave major scale before we left so I could assess how well he had remembered what we had spent the most time on during the lesson. I believe this lesson went well, I successfully taught Art how to play a 2-octave major scale, achieving my aims for the lesson while also answering any questions my student had allowing him to develop in the ways he wants to as a musician in student-led lessons. 

The next lesson is shown in this next clip where you can see me introducing Art to the modes of the major scale, the clip begins when talking about the second mode- Dorian. This is a topic that he had many questions about, he had heard of many of the scales but had lots of gaps in his knowledge, so we spent some time going through all of the scales and explaining them. I had created a sheet with every mode of the major scale written out starting on the note C, this meant that he could see every scale in comparison to C major allowing him to see and hear which notes have to be altered to create the new scale. 

MODES CHEAT SHEET INSERT HERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is a lot of information and upon reflection I have realised that I moved my student through new concepts very fast and it may have been better to introduce the modes more gradually with maybe one lesson focussing on one or two of the scales, their corresponding chords, how to use them in context, and given some examples of some songs that use them. This would have been a helpful way to learn the information while keeping the lesson more engaging and fun.

In the clip below you can see me and Art recapping what we have worked on so far in the lesson, this alone took over 10 minutes and I realise I may have tried to introduce too much information at once.

In one of our next lessons Art and I had a brief catch up at the beginning of the lesson and he explained how the mode theory that we explored a couple of weeks before had helped him in a session when he was playing drums. This was brilliant however he said that he would like to recap the shapes and the scales as, even though he now understands how it all works, he hasn’t had time to practice. For me as a teacher, this confirmed my worry that we had covered too much too fast and that in future, I would teach this concept at a slower, and much steadier pace. We decided that for the rest of the lesson we would have a more relaxed approach and work on getting a song sounding clean and correct- the song is a fast-paced slap bass song with octaves meaning it involves a few of the techniques that we have worked on in previous lessons and is proof of Art’s application of learning. 

Below are two clips from different lessons including our catch up at the beginning of a lesson, and some improvisation in one of our last lessons that we had to use some of the techniques, arpeggios, and scales that we have been going through together. After spending a lesson on arpeggios, we used the next lesson to work on playing these arpeggios through different keys and over multiple octaves while vocalising the notes and finding them on the fretboard. 

I used this improvisation task as a form of formative assessment to get an idea of how well Art had remembered and understood the last few weeks of learning. I also believe that it is a valuable tool in stuent led approaches to teaching, taking inspiration from the Orff approach which “encouraged children and teachers to learn about music through discovery, creativity, and improvisation” (Jorgensen, 2010, p.3). From this I concluded that each scale and arpeggio was understood properly however Art wasn’t quite grasping the context of the theory. This made me realise that I could have spent more time putting these skills and theoretical concepts into practice in the context of a song or specifically designed exercise for my student. This is something that I will remember and ensure I do in future lessons. 

I believe that overall, Art learnt a great deal from our lessons, and we made some brilliant progress together. As my first experience teaching, I found it very interesting to go back to the basics and test my own understanding of some more foundational concepts that, as an experienced musician, I assumed I knew very well. For example, in the last clip when we are talking about improvisation, I make a clear mistake regarding the notes in the major pentatonic scale initially claiming that you don’t play the 2nd degree! I found that teaching somebody else also helped me to learn at the same time and think more critically about my own technique and playing. I learnt a lot from teaching Art the bass, teaching a student that is a very good musician on another instrument and has played the instrument before but was self-taught was a difficult thing to navigate. Due to my student being an experienced musician I decided to teach new concepts very fast, and this is a mistake that I have learned from and will not repeat in the future. I also found that it was important to work to my student’s strengths, as a drummer Art has an incredible understanding of rhythm, this meant that, unlike many musicians, when reading sheet music, the notes were the harder part and rhythm came more easily. In future I would use this to my advantage as a teacher, for example, using rhythmic reading exercises to keep my student engaged when learning how to read pitches on a stage. We worked through harmonic and melodic theories as well as technical excercises, correct posture, and correct technique. We spoke about instrument specific concepts such as economy of motion as well as individual changes that a bassist can make to create their own style of playing using approaches to techniques that feel the most natural and work the best for the individual. Due to the fact I was teaching a very advanced drummer, we looked very little at rhythmic ideas and this is something that I feel may have been an oversight, even though he has a strong understanding of rhythm it would have been beneficial to apply this to the bass guitar during our lessons. In summary, our lessons were successful and my student improved significantly as a bassist, there were some mistakes made in the teaching process that I have learnt from such as moving through new topics too fast and not utilising rhythm in our lessons. The act of teaching music helped to improve my own musicality and with every lesson I believe I improved as both a teacher and musician.

Bibliography:

• Jorgenson, L. (2010) Analysis of the Music Education Philosophy of Carl Orff, MINDS@UW Home. Available at: https://minds.wisconsin.edu/handle/1793/49113 (Accessed: 11 May 2026)
• Pomerleau-Turcotte, J. et al. (2023) Building a mental toolbox: Relationships between stretegy choice and sight-singing performance in Higher Education, Psychology of music. Available at: https://pmc.ncbi.nln.nih.gov/articles/PMC9751441/? (Accessed: 11 May 2026)
• Ryan, R.M. and Deci, E.L. (2000) ‘Intrinsic and extrinsic motivations: Classic definitions and New Directions’, Contemporary Educational Psychology pp. 54-67. Doi: 10.1006/ceps.1999.1020.
• Sánchez, M.R. (2024) ‘The Suzuki method in primary music education: Cultivating values, motivation, and musical competence’, Journal of Artifical Intelligence General Science (JAIGS) ISSN:3006-4023, 2(1), pp. 248-260. Doi: 10.60087/jaigs.vol2.issue1.p360
• Zahra, SA (2024) ‘The Importance of Student Learning Styles in Determining Learning Strategies’ Department of Indonesian Language Education, Faculty of Teacher Training and Education, Banten-Indonesia. Available at: https://jurnal.untira.ac.id/index.php/iclc/article/download/27064/pdf (Accessed: 13 May 2026