New article from Tom Hess Plans Are Not Goals

Anyone who has read any of my articles related to the subject of learning/teaching guitar knows I am very goal oriented in my teaching. Before I begin teaching or coaching (yes there are differences between the two) I always begin by asking the student what his or her musical goals are (both the short and long term). Most of these students don’t really have (or at least aren’t able to communicate to me) any true goals. Because of this, they often have had only limited success in working with previous teachers, and usually even less success trying to teach themselves. It is easy getting almost every student to answer my question, “What are your short and long musical goals?” the problem is, they confuse plans with goals. In their mind, these two ideas are interchangeable, having the same meaning.[more..]