In the example above, I supplemented the traditional symbols for up and down strokes with arrows, because students find the traditional symbols confusing.
Most students think that the symbol for an up stroke looks like it should be a down stroke. Conversely, students think the down stroke looks like a table. The color coded arrows give a guide to strumming the strings. The direction of the up and down arrows indicates the direction of the pick stroke.
In guitar, it is common to have the student swing the pick up and down on every beat and sub-beat. The pick strokes the string when the music indicates a note or chord is to be sounded. The pick “misses” the string on the strokes that make no sound.
A red arrow tells the student to stroke the string, and a blue arrow tells the student to miss the string. As an example, in the first bar the student would say, “Down, up, down, up, down, miss, down, miss” while performing the picking on all of the open strings.
Then, after mastering the strum pattern, the student adds the chord changes. The chords are color coded to help increase reaction time. The color coded alternate picking controls the rhythm.