Reasons to Take Guitar at AMHS
4 reasons why taking the guitar electives offered at AMHS can be beneficial
At a school like Academic Magnet, most of us put a decent amount of thought and effort into planning out our own schedules. Most decisions regarding registration for next year have been made, but there are still years in the future and potential adjustments to be made.
Here, I will be listing some of the main benefits of taking the guitar electives offered at AMHS.
Time Management
Taking classes like guitar can help with time management skills. While guitar can be used to destress and serve as a break from other classes, it still takes time and effort to learn the skills. It is a class where practice needs to be spread out and consistent to ensure retention and build muscle memory.
When we learn to build a schedule with time to practice every day, this ability can be applied in or other classes and help us establish more efficient scheduling and time management skills.
Stress Relief
At a school like Academic Magnet—that focuses so heavily on academic excellence—it’s important to take breaks. In the words of our talented AMHS guitar teacher Mr. Grimshaw,
Music is a vehicle to teach work ethic and a lifelong skill that can spark creativity and provide enjoyment and a release of the day to day stresses that life brings. — Mr. Grimshaw
At this school, we devote so much of our time to schoolwork. And, even when we’re not actively working, our mental to-do list can still clog our minds during rest. While guitar takes effort and practice to learn, practicing chords can be relaxing when compared to the high mental energy required in most of our assignments.
And, once you’ve built up a bank of songs within your skill level, you can always go back to them to take breaks from other schoolwork. So many popular songs only require basic chords to play. And, once you’ve put in the time and effort to learn those basic chords, you can go back and play your favorite songs anytime you want, with muscle memory on your side.
Creativity
It is equally important for us to pursue activities that allow us to be creative, when so much of our education revolves around memorization and repetition.
Pablo Picasso said, ‘Every child is an artist, the problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.’ As a music teacher I try to teach my students how to ‘remember’ to be an artist. — Mr. Grimshaw
Allowing expression of creativity is one of AMHS guitar teacher Mr. Grimshaw’s favorite things about teaching the class. “Music is math, science, history, and literature all rolled into one very powerful art form,” he says. “Pablo Picasso said, ‘Every child is an artist, the problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.’ As a music teacher I try to teach my students how to ‘remember’ to be an artist.”
Creativity is a muscle, and it’s important that we remember to use it. “Music offers not only lessons in work ethic and creativity but also really begins to bridge the gaps between all of the other disciplines,” Mr. Grimshaw adds. When we practice creativity in our hobbies, it can help us think more analytically in our academic classes.
Learning a Skill
In school, we learn a lot. We take in and regurgitate information every single day, but it’s not often that we get the opportunity to learn a tangible and performable skill.
Guitar is one of these opportunities. In many of our classes, the information we learn won’t be useful in practicality until years later when we begin to build our careers. However, the skills learned in guitar can be used immediately. Every new chord opens up new songs to play. And once you’ve built up a base of songs that your muscle memory is used to, you can go back and use those skills anytime.
