Are you a music teacher who wants to add songwriting education to your skillset? In this post, we're going to dive into five of my favorite tips to help you teach the craft of songwriting. The ideas here are written with kids in mind, but they will work for any student you come across.

1. Outline Your Lyrics

When I write a song with a new student, my first step is almost always outlining. Outlining is an awesome starting point for any songwriter, but it’s especially great for kids who are shy, hesitant to talk about themselves, or who feel intimidated by the process. It’s also awesome for people who just don’t know what to write or who tend to get stuck halfway through.

2. Add instrument learning

I always like to incorporate a little bit of singing and a little bit of a harmonic instrument into songwriting lessons. This will empower your kids to practice writing when you’re not around, it’ll give even really skeptical parents some tangible evidence that lessons are benefiting their child, and most importantly, it’ll make your students feel so proud of themselves. I generally recommend starting with piano or ukulele because they’re the easiest to pick up quickly, but if your student already plays or is desperate to learn the guitar, fabulous! You can even start by learning how to use a piano roll on a DAW if you want to explore the production side of songwriting.

You can start super simply - learn the notes and plunk things out. Many piano students are able to play the chords in C Major within the first couple of lessons, but even super young kids with small hands can usually learn to play thirds, so write songs around those simple intervals and add the 5th of the chords later. There are a bunch of ukulele chords that only require the use of one finger, so start by writing some songs around chords like C, Am, and C7. When they seem ready, introduce some 2-finger chords like F or A. Pretty soon, they’ll be playing all sorts of chords!

It can be scary for anyone to sing in front of a stranger, but for kids to sing in front of a grown up they’re just meeting? Gah! Terrifying! For these kids, break things down. I like to start lessons by singing vocal warm ups together. It’s super mundane and will start to feel like a comfortable part of lessons within the first few weeks. It’ll also give you a sense of where they’re at with pitch matching and rhythm and it’ll get them in the habit of warming up early, which is a really good thing. Once they seem comfortable with singing warm ups, start taking those training wheels off by singing along less often. Some kids will actually request that you stop singing along as early as the first lesson!

3. Melody writing

You’ll have some students who just sing whatever comes to them and create awesome vocal melodies without thinking, but some kids will really need a push - especially super analytical kids. For these kids, break the process down.

Some fun things to try:

• Play “leapfrog” with steps/skips/jumps

• Figure out the notes in each chord, choosing one as an anchor, and fill in the gaps

• Practice improv on your instrument. On ukulele, learn the notes on the A string. On the piano, start with only white keys.

Each of these exercises is outlined in the video below!

4. Work on editing, production, and performance

When a song is finished, don’t be afraid to tweak it! Get into the habit of making changes. Add software instruments. Have fun messing around with different sounds. Basically, make sure that your students understand that songwriting isn’t a static thing. There is always going to be more to play with, add, and explore.

When you’ve worked on a song for a while and it feels finished, work on performance skills. Playing in a concert or recital, filming a video for their family, or recording their song can all be awesome “final projects” to bookend the songwriting process. That way, they can really take a moment to be proud of what they’ve accomplished and celebrate before moving onto something new.

5. Get to know them!

Songwriting lessons can feel like therapy for a lot of kids. Many kids don’t often get a chance to express themselves in purely creative, judgement-free ways, so the best things you can do are to trust them, learn from them, and get to know them in a real way. Each student you have is going to be so different from the last, so part of your job is going to be adapting and improvising to fit each student’s needs.

The first question I like to ask is super simple: what music do you like to listen to? If it’s Disney, focus on plot-development and creating stories for characters they already love. If it’s pop music, you can focus on song form and creating chord progressions. If it’s 80’s hair metal, work on creating awesome guitar riffs. Rap? Work on rhyme, meter, and production. You’ll always find fun things to talk about and explore if you let them lead from a place of excitement and curiosity. From there, keep it low-pressure, be kind and encouraging, and give them space to create and your student will start to open up to you and take your advice to heart. And from my experience, watching my students grow and develop as writers, musicians, and people is the best thing in the whole world.

♫ Time Stamps:

00:00 - Intro

00:22 - Lyric Writing

03:45 - Instruments

08:18 - Melody Writing

10:52 - Finishing a Song

11:54 - Get to Know Your Students

I hope you found this post helpful! If you did, consider subscribing.