Tried this yet? Heard of it? “Learn the guitar neck!” Based on the few basic chord shapes of C, A, G, E, G and D this “system” sets up a basis for a novice or simple application player to gain ability without much investment, and this appeals to the teachers that never did the work to actually learn their instrument. Might be akin to banging away on a piano and rocking out like a 1950’s rocker versus a skilled concert pianist. Nevertheless it is a method and it is considered a viable way to get playing.
Instead of learning how a chord is put together and how a guitar is tuned, an imprint is provided that negates inversions and tuning to reveal one glance of a handfull of chords. There is some knowledge to be gleaned from these patterns based on a few inversions but considering the level of difficulty involved in learning the notes on the neck it seems short term. I consider this CAGED method to be some what of a shell game, a convenient con that lowers expectations whilst wasting time and money, in application it provides an income for less fortunate guitar players who feel forced to explain something they actually know little about. After all, no one will know, especially not the ones who spend their money on this method. It will take less than a month to memorize the entire fretboard, at which point all of these CAGED chords will reveal themselves. I do not use the CAGED method to teach, but fret not, its concepts , which are very basic, are included in my lessons. I teach all beginners the C, A, G, E and D chords first lesson.