Today felt like a breakthrough for some of the kids. Fortunately, the Redwood staff were very helpful in getting the kids’ ukuleles tuned prior to class, so we had more time to spend getting everyone comfortable in their playing positions. Some of the kids needed a bit of a refresher on how to hold the ukulele properly, but that was a good time to get everyone comfortable with using the language of the ukulele’s parts, which helped us later on in class once we were playing chords, switching between different rhythms, and strumming patterns. I find that with this group, the more I ask them to repeat back certain terms and principles, the better. There was definite improvement in terms of finding frets and playing individual strings, instead of strumming them all at once. My challenge for the kids this week was to make up lyrics to their own tuning song, so they can sing along to the open notes while they tune. There are always more opportunities for ear training!