![]() ![]() Once students have mastered the song they were working on, they are allowed creative freedom to make their own arrangement of the song. I also set up a “Rainbow Blanket” at the front of the room that designates a spot where students can physically communicate their need for additional help-offering a space where students can get additional help without the need for raising hands or disrupting other students by yelling for attention.ĭrip Drop with first grade: Step 4: Extension ![]() I let students choose wherever they would like to sit in my classroom and who-if anyone-they would like to work with. I have found this step works best when I allow students to choose the way in which they want to work. In the application step, students do just that- apply their comprehension of the music to the ukulele. By the end of these exercises, students will have the information they need to apply their skills to music. If they are working on strumming, we focus on how to play the chords of the song, and how we identify when to play those chords. ![]() If they are working on plucking, we focus on the pitches on the musical staff. In this step, students understand what they are looking at when they are reading the music. I do this because you will find that I added on every ukulele in my classroom nine stickers on the fretboards that have color-coded pitches on them (see photo below). The only difference with my musical staff is that I color code every music note, as well as the chords notated above the staff. Therefore, I believe in starting students off by learning the full musical staff. Students learn best through exposure to knowledge beyond their current understanding. Tinker Tailor with Kindergarten: Step 2: Comprehension But if you introduce any song with a dance, game, story, etc., students are more willing to work hard at learning it because of that positive experience they originally had. If a song is preselected for a student without allowing the child to play with it, they are less willing to learn it, no matter what age. I believe there is a correlation between how a student feels about a song and how motivated they are to learn it. Whether it’s Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star or Beethoven’s 9th Symphony, I want my students to enjoy the music they are creating. My applied teaching may greatly vary between classes, but they all follow a guided four-step instructional sequence. But I can tell you from personal experience, by teaching ukulele to students starting from Kindergarten through 5th grade, we are setting our students up to become engaged self-motivated learners of the music making process.Īnswering this question is very complex, because how I utilize the ukulele in teaching is dependent on the lesson concept and age-level. We never even fathom the idea of teaching it to students who are only 5 years old. When educators think of the ukulele in music education, our minds often go to 5th grade and junior high students. When not being used as an isolated unit, but as a cornerstone of the curriculum, the ukulele can do more than you ever thought possible. You may be wondering how all of this is possible? My students have been able to reach these objectives through the use of the ukulele. These musicians are my Kindergarten through 5th grade students. ![]() Feel free to leave a comment with the ukelele songs you’d like to learn.All Uke Can Do: Enhancing General Music through the UkuleleĮvery week I get to work with a talented group of musicians who analyze, arrange, compose, improvise, and perform amazing pieces of music, all before recess. Once you have them down you can move on to other ukulele songs that employ other chords, and then onwards to more challenging songs. How nice it is that the easiest chords on the uke also yield a massive amount of songs! We listed only a few here, but there are many more that use just these four chords. And of course, you can do that with any instrument. With just four chords you can easily learn eight songs in a day. There are some great resources for learning the ukulele today. In other words, a fantastic song if you are starting out on the instrument. The strum pattern in D DU UDU and the chords are G, C, and D. Leaving on a Jet Plane is a great song to start learning the uke with, as it also features simple lyrics and a structure that is not hard to remember. It is easy to learn, with a simple form and a bare-bones strumming pattern that is very effective. This is a classic song by John Denver and features only three chords. ![]()
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