Teaching ukulele in elementary music is something I really look forward to every year. Fun story- my dad is actually the one who got me (and my family!) into the ukulele. They helped me get five ukuleles to teach in my first school when neither I nor my school could afford them. I had ten students sign up for my first after-school ukulele club and it was such a joy! Since then, I’ve been fortunate enough to get a classroom set through Donors Choose, and in my current position, the PTO has funded a class set.
If you don’t have a classroom set of ukes, no worries! Your other students could play a harder accompanying part on xylophones. Or, you could have students practice on long strips of cardboard with strings and frets drawn on them. They’ll still work on the muscle memory they need to transition strings or chords, but it cuts down on the noise.
Teach Individual Strings
I like start teaching ukulele in elementary music by introducing the ukulele in third grade. We primarily focus on individual strings in third grade, especially because this is also the grade level that I introduce treble clef to. When teaching the string names, I use the acronym “Green Cats Eat Ants” to help students remember the strings from top to bottom. Of course, the students can oftentimes come up with some really great sentences on their own, so I always let the students come up with their own acronyms, too! I also make sure that students know the string numbers, with 4 being the top string (G) and 1 being the bottom string (A).
The first song we learn on the ukulele is Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. They don’t need to press any strings down for the first line, and it’s easily recognizable. Their faces light up when they realize that they can play a part of the song that quickly! When it’s time for the next line, though, it does get a little trickier. I tell them the note F is 3.2. The first number is the string number and the second number is the fret. Once they understand how that works, they do much better with the note D, which would be 2.3 (second string, third fret.)
Sometimes that’s where I stop. You could also teach them Apple Tree, Lucy Locket, We Are Dancing (or any other song that uses mi, sol, and la- those are all open strings E, G, and A! Actually, now that I write this, those are probably better to start with than Twinkle Twinkle!) My third graders still complain about their fingers hurting a lot, so I don’t do ukulele for very long with them.
Teach Chords
Sometimes I do ukulele in fourth grade, but not every year. Teaching recorder takes up a lot of time, so some years we just don’t get to it. So in fifth grade (and fourth if we are doing ukulele that year), I introduce ukulele chords to the students. This is a great way to add in the theory of what a chord is, plus there are so many songs in the curriculum textbooks that have easy cords to play along with.
C major
The first chord I start with is C major because you can start singing simple songs once you’ve taught that one chord. The students are already familiar with my decimal system at this point, so I tell them that it’s 1.3 and they know that it’s the bottom string and the third fret. We sing easy songs like Row Row Row Your Boat (this isn’t really a one-chord song, but it works and is a good time to review a round, too), Lucy Locket, Star Light, and Apple Tree.
A minor and F major
After C, we learn Am. This is another easy chord to learn (4.2- top string, second fret) and you can play a couple of Adele songs with these two chords! I took her song, “Send My Love” and brought it down a step to be in the key of C so that we could play to it. The kids thought it sounded funny because she already has a deeper voice than they’re used to hearing, but they enjoyed playing a pop song. Her song, “Oh My God” is also a two-chord song. After they know A minor, they’re halfway there to F major, so that’s what we learn next! We do Achy Breaky Heart, which uses F and C.
G major
The last chord I would love to get to is G, but I teach this on a class-by-class basis. There is so much we could do with the 12 bar blues, but G is a tricky one to learn and transition to, so most of my classes don’t get there. Though, you can always have kids in three groups to play the three different chords during a song. If you can, though, you can do so much! Between teaching genres of music (blues, jazz, rock and roll, even pop!), composition and improvisation, you could spend weeks on lessons using those three chords!
Composing & Reading Music
I would also have the students create their own songs. I would use the 4×4 matrix in my free composition worksheet packet and let students create their own chord progression and lyrics to perform.
One of my favorite ukulele projects is when my fifth graders get to choose a song they want to learn on the ukulele. I use Ukutabs and let them decide on a song with a partner or group. Sometimes they look at the song and decide it’s too hard, but they oftentimes surprise me with how hard they work to learn new, harder chords because it’s something they want to learn how to do. It’s so transferable to their lives outside of school and really shows them a way they can take music with them after they leave my classroom.
Conclusion
There is so much you can do with the ukulele. I truly believe that it’s one of the best instruments to teach kids! After we finish the unit, I always get emails from parents asking about brand recommendations because their child asked for one for their birthday or Christmas. If you want to know more or have any questions, comment below or DM me on Instagram (@caffeinated.j).
