This exercise is from the Core Skills Strumming section.

Here we shall play a new chord - A minor. This is a very common chord, so a good one to learn. The 3 notes for A minor are: A C E

From the Low A string we are playing the notes: x A E A C E

It is the same chord 'shape' as the E major chord in the first 2 exercises, except all your fingers are placed one string higher. Make sure your fingers are on the right strings, and that you aren't accidentally playing an E major chord again! Use your eyes and ears to check yourself against the ActionTab if you aren't sure.

One important thing to learn here is that when strumming chords sometimes you don't use all 6 strings. A minor is one such chord. In the core skills picking exercises you came across some others, e.g. C major and D major. There are many such chords so it is important to learn how to strum with omitting certain strings. The good news is that with chords like A minor, C major, etc we only omit the end strings (e.g. the Low E string or the high E string).

At this point it is worth mentioning that another way of omitting strings from a strum is to mute notes with your fretboard hand. This is dealt with in more detail in our section on Muting. We mention it here because some people find it easier to exclude strings from their strums by using this technique. So it is worth being aware of, and experimenting to see what suits you best. You can see the Thumb Dot with M in it. Just curl your thumb over the top edge of the neck and touch the string. Don't fret it, that will make it play a note instead of stopping the string from vibrating.

With the A minor chord in this exercise we omit the Low E string. Notice that in the ActionTab a picking dot doesn't appear beside the Low E string string even once. This will be even more apparent if you select the "Light Strings" option from the Settings menu. Only play strings that a dot appears beside! In this ActionTab you will see that the top 5 strings have consecutive strumming dots appear, but not the Low E string. Just play what you see.

When strumming all 6 strings things are a little easier. However, when omitting a string you need to control your strum a lot more, or mute out the string you wish to omit. The best way to learn is simply through practice. Aim to make contact with the strings starting only at the A and strumming down. Make sure to watch the introduction video for tips on accomplishing this and a quick insight into different ways of achieving this. A quick look at the muting video will also help!