Learning to play the uke with your kids

orangutangle

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Thanks in large part to you guys, I've decided to bite the bullet and learn the uke. I am 40 and have never learnt to play an instrument. I would like to learn together with my seven year old daughter, so I've picked up a Makala dolphin for her. But I don't know where to start! I'm guessing it would probably make sense if we were both trying to learn the same chord positions at the same time (at least at the beginning), so we can help each other out. But what chords to learn? Or should we try a simple song to start?

Should I pick up a book? Get some tab charts? Get a teacher in? I'd be really grateful for any pointers...
 
Thanks for the Dr Uke link, Jim, I hadn't come across it before. Also, I've just found this on Ukehunt: So You’ve Just Got Your First Ukulele (PDF) which looks like a good place to start.

So I guess that's some good teaching material to be getting on with. I guess what I'm asking is to hear about your experiences playing with your kids - how to get them interested, keep their attention, deal with frustration etc.
 
Yes, that's a good tune all right, she'll like that. This may be a dumb question, but how do I translate the chords from that page (which are for guitar) to ukulele tuning?
 
I use the Hal Leonard Ukulele Chord Book (available on Amazon) to find chords. It's cheap and indispensable!
 
I'm in a similar boat as the OP. I'm going to learn with my 7 year old daughter, but I do have guitar experience.

orangutangle - good luck with the learning process. I know it will be a lot of fun. And it'll be rewarding to spend that time with your daughter.
 
I am 42 and never played a thing and just decided to pick up the uke about 6 weeks ago. My son is 10 and has plunked on it a bit but not shown great interest, until I told him he could post a song on youtube. Now it looks like he will be joining me at the UWC!

My 18-month old daughter just wants to stick her hand in the sound hole and yank on the strings :(
 
Yes, that's a good tune all right, she'll like that. This may be a dumb question, but how do I translate the chords from that page (which are for guitar) to ukulele tuning?

Just ignore the guitar parts at the top, and focus on the chords. A C-chord is the same notes whether played on guitar or uke- CGE forms the chord. For uke, it's GCEC, formed by fretting the bottom string on the third fret. So you can also use guitar cheat sheets, and just play the uke chords...
 
This may be a dumb question, but how do I translate the chords from that page (which are for guitar) to ukulele tuning?
Don't want to sound like advertising, but something like this might help you. Ask Google, there's plenty out there. Plus quite a few cool smartphone apps for the same purpose (just in case).
 
Don't want to sound like advertising, but something like this might help you. Ask Google, there's plenty out there. Plus quite a few cool smartphone apps for the same purpose (just in case).

Thanks Louis0815 - I actually got this chart with the Makala... just wasn't sure how to read it when I first looked at it (sheepish grin). But now I get it, and it will be quite handy, thanks for pointing it out.

Thanks everyone for your kind words, I'll be reporting back no doubt...
 
Hi! I started on the Uke over 2 years ago now, and my wife and 4 of our 5 kids have joined in. Our 5th is a special needs child, and is not quite ready Yet. My kids are older though, and i have been a drummer for a long time,so we do have some prior musical experience.

My philosophy has been to have my kids play a "real" song as soon as possible. keep it fun, and light hearted, and don't tax their attention span in practice sessions. Also, while learning together is important, you may want to work extra on your own, so you can gradually become more of a teacher to your children. You can also do duets down the road, and you will eventually learn to how to re arrange songs to suit your own needs.

It has been a great blessing to me and my family. we performed as a family at an open mic night back in March. It was a blast!

Keep at it, take your time, and have fun. you will be building incredible lifetime memories together!

Take care,

Tom
 
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