5 Bad Chord Habits To Break Today ~ Chord Mistakes My Students Make

Greetings from Okinawa! In today's video I am going to share with you the mistakes I see on a DAILY basis in my music classroom. Every day 60-75 kids come to my class and play ukuleles, so these are the mistakes and bad habits I see most frequently.
Obviously, my students make more than 5 mistakes, so if you would like me to make more videos like this, let me know in the comments below and I will gladly do it!

Alrighty... here we go.
0:26 So the first mistake that I see is that fingers and strings don't meet in the right place. Naturally, we want to use the bed of our fingers to play the ukulele, but that doesn't leave much room for other strings to ring!
If you physically CAN NOT play with the fingertips, it may be because of habit #5... and habit #5 is VERY easy to fix!
I know I spent A LOT of time explaining mistake/habit number 1 in this video, but that's because it's the one I spend more time on in the classroom! If I can get a student to play with the TIPS of their fingers, anything is possible!

2:01 The next mistake I see is that students have their fingers accidentally touch the next string (either with their nail or their finger), and it creates a buzz, a high-pitched sound, or it mutes the string altogether.

2:57 The third mistake that most students make in the beginning is twofold... on one end, students thumbs are all over the place. In order to avoid this, I have stickers on the back of the ukulele so that ALL of my students place the thumb in the same place. On the other end students don't SQUEEZE the string hard enough for it to ring beautifully.

3:54 Bad habit #4 is muted strings due to long sleeves, jackets, sweaters, hair, jewelry, shall I continue?! Students will look at me with a frustrated look wondering why their ukulele doesn't sound right. After rolling up their sleeves or moving

5:07 Bad habit and reason #5 why chords don't sound good... LONG NAILS on the fretboard hand. This is the most frustrating habit because it's not like I can cut my student's nails, you know?! That is not something I can change or control!!! Luckily, this is a mistake you can avoid. Keep the nails on your chord hand short and you'll see just how much easier it is to play with the fingertips.


For those of you who are new to my community... Hi! I'm Ms. B and I'm an elementary music teacher. I teach grades K, 1, and 2 and in my classroom we play ukuleles every day.


***

ABOUT THIS UKULELE
I am playing the Enya Tenor Ukulele. To see an unboxing video about this ukulele, follow this link    • Enya Ukulele DOUBLE UNBOXING (Concert...  

TO ORDER
this uke, follow the link below
http://amzn.to/2ESS6SK

***

S N A P C H A T
plazi

I N S T A G R A M
  / plazi  

F A C E B O O K
  / bernadettetea.  .

T E A C H E R S P A Y T E A C H E R S
https://tinyurl.com/hfy2c35

E M A I L
[email protected]

WRITE TO ME HERE
Bernadette Etcheverry
PSC 482 BOX 28
FPO, AP 96362



Hi! My name is Ms. B and I am a happy teacher working abroad. I love technology, I love learning more about the ukulele, and I love helping beginners.

I hope you found value in my video. Please let me know if there is a video I can make that will help you.