New School Year

Well, the school year is off to a fast start. I am coming to the end of first quarter on Friday. The 'Ukulele class will be rotating out to their next elective and new students will be starting in November. This year the challenge is having 38 students in an elective class and 36 (so far) in my core classes. Gotta love budget cuts. !-)

The kids are doing really well even with the large size of the class. It is a challenge to get to all of them however.

The after school club is also doing well. So far we have had 50-59 students coming after school. The great thing is that most of them have their own 'ukulele! I am only loaning out about 12 each week. I also have 4 high school students who have come and want to help out with the kids, which helps me. So far they are jamming with each other. In November we will be learning a song to play with the choir for the winter concert.

Also, I want to give a big Mahalo to Louis Wu @ Ohana 'Ukulele who donated 10 'ukuleles to my school program. Many, Many thanks to Louis and Ohana 'Ukulele.

Here is a picture of the first quarter students showing off their ukuleles.

Busy, Busy Busy

Have been remiss in posting. First, Karsten's video of "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" is on youtube and I will figure out how to post the link or embed it in the blog.




This school year has been very busy with teaching Ukulele, the after school club and the busyness of school. I haven't been playin as much as I would like but hopefully that will change soon. I am working on setting up a way for students to create their own music videos, getting the equipment and learning about it all. The good news is that this year the Ukulele Club is running itself. They bring in the songs, jam come up with ideas to earn money and the like. It is really great. There are 25-30 students each week, which is a good size group. This year's president is Christian Monsalud. A good ukulele player and someone who is good at teaching. He is bringing a great feel to the club.