Over the course of this semester I have been tasked with learning something utilizing the technology around me. When I first started I thought this would be easy I use technology all the time what could be so hard. Well let me tell you as someone that has done most of my learning in a traditional setting ( a classroom) it posed a bigger challenge than I thought. Being self motivated is not an easy thing when their are so many obligations that take up our time. While this is not the first online course I have taken it seems to be a recurring theme for me that I struggle when I do not have face to face meetings to help scaffold my learning. This I believe will aid me it creating lessons that utilize technology and PLC for my students. Understanding the roadblocks they may encounter will allow me to anticipate their struggles and to build in checkpoints to ensure learning is taking place and a community is being built. This is an important skill for students to learn more and more the world interacts using digital communities and just the like the physical community we live in students must learn how to treat others with respect and kindness. This lesson will be transferable beyond the classroom of course we want to create students who reflect a positive and caring mentality but we also want to prepare them to work using these digital communities being able to have thoughtful discussions that help one another is critical to a functioning community and this applies the digital as well as physical. Overall I will say I struggled with this assignment but that does not mean I did not learn anything.
During this semester I have been able to cultivate a PLC using social media and web tools that allow me to take in content as well as produce it. Using social media sites like Twitter have been a great way for my to share my learning while being able to find a plethora of resources from which to utilize. YouTube is another great resource that I have used before I have always viewed the site as a time killer something to watch funny cat videos online. YouTube turned out to be one of my biggest teachers when it came to learning Ukulele. The last tool I utilized was a community on Google + dedicated to people who like and want to play the Ukulele this community page was almost like a coach telling me I can do it on the sideline of a ball game. The community offered discussion, photos and general place to share the content we all were creating. These personal learning communities helped me to push through the hard parts of learning by providing support from so many different backgrounds. These PLC also provided me with a more traditional sense of community of people working to help each other even when they may be miles away. The historian in me is in awe of this power for most of my education the ability to communicate and transfer ideas has been a focus of my studies looking at how humans communicate and how readily that information is available has been the benchmark of how far society can move. Looking at what I have been able to accomplish in t
Well the time has come to post my first performance, this was a little scary for me and took some help from my family. Over the past few months I have been practicing my Ukulele learning how to play "you are my sunshine. The video while I do not sing represents my efforts to teach my self using technology as my textbook. I have viewed countless Youtube videos, read blogs, tweets and surfed the web endlessly to help me achieve this goal. Hope you enjoy and please be kind with your remarks still new at this. While practicing my ukulele I began to notice the strings were becoming out of tune. I am lucky enough to have a sister who play's guitar and used her electric tuner shown on the left. For those without a tuner there are tons of apps that you can download onto your phone or tablet unfortunately I do not own an iPhone or iPad so I can not speak for the mac products as for android I can help point you in the right direction. One app that I have found useful was the easy ukulele-ukulele tuner you can download the app for free from the google play store it's easy to use. You can use this app to tune each individual string it uses a chromatic tuning setting making it easy to tune for those of us that are not classically trained in music. If you feel like getting a tuner I would suggest going down to a local music shop or guitar center (they will tune it for you) and pick up an electric tuner they are easy to use and most store will show you how if you do not already. Below is a great Youtube video on how to tune your Ukulele while he uses a fancy tuner the same principles apply to other tuners as well. Happy tuning Ukuers Well folks now that I know what song I will learn how to play I need to work on the chords. I have been very lucky in my life to be around so many gifted musicians two of my college roommates were music majors my cousin is a music teacher. Speaking with one of my old college roommates Charlie Francis who has played in bands throughout college and post college life (checkout Boss 501 and Big Tree Fall Down). During our conversation he gave me a few tips one was to pick a song and learn the chords try to build the muscle memory in my fingers for the chords needed in the song. He added that as I choose new songs the chords will carry over and I can learn new chords as the new songs are added building my ability to play more and more songs. So again I am off to practice and build that muscle memory into my fingers. My goals is by the end of month to have a video of my self playing on this blog page. For your viewing pleasure I have linked Charlies first college band and one of my favorite songs by them below.(Charlie sings lead vocals and plays the trombone) Enjoy. Well after careful though I have decided to focus on playing a song that is very near to my heart its a song my grandmother and mother would sing to me. My Grandmother grew up during the Great Depression as the daughter of a beekeeper and in her memory I would love to learn to play this song for her great grandchildren which she never got to meet. Below is a great youtube tutorial showing the notes to play the song with a neat little graphic to help ukulele players of all ability. Below that video is the song you are my sunshine from the O Brother Where Art Thou? sound track. This movie depicts the time period with which the song was originally written and for me why the song has so much meaning behind it. For many farmers which all four of my grandparents grew up in farming families and two of which grew up during the Great Depression. So wish me luck in my endeavor and hopefully in the next few weeks I will become brave enough to post a few videos of my own playing and singing the song. Hello ladies and gentlemen this week I decided it was time to buy a Ukulele. I went down to the local Guitar Center and got a nice deal on a mid range uke it was about 64 dollars but I splurged and got the 2 year insurance just incase something happens (knock on wood). Well guess its time to start learning I surfed around for a bit and found a very nice intro lesson on playing the ukulele. I learned to play piano as a young child and even took singing lessons for a while, yet never tried guitar. I started with strumming something I am not familiar with. I found a nice youtube video on five basic strumming patterns for beginners these patterns are on a 4 count. A 4 count is just like it sounds a nice rhythm where you count 1 . . . 2 . . . 3 . . . 4. The first of the five patterns is a simple one four down strums: down, down down, down. The second pattern adds an up strum in between each down strum: one and(up) two and three and four, 1 and 2 and 3 and 4. The third pattern is a two down strums followed by an up strum: one two and three four and, 1 2 and 3 4 and. the fourth pattern is a combination of the second and third pattern its a down up down down up down pattern: one and two three and four, 1 and 2 3 and 4. The last pattern is by far the hardest it is down down up up down up pattern: one two and and four and, 1 2 and and 4 and. Notice the third beat is replaced by an up strum. Now if this sounds a little confusing i have the youtube video attached below which also links to the website ukuleleltricks.com. Well now its time to practice hopefully I will be able to play a few of these songs soon. Hello everyone this is the beginning of my journey to learn to play the Ukulele. Part of becoming a teacher is to be able to understand how students learn. In order to think like a learner I must become one. As a young child I learned to play piano but quickly lost the skill once I stopped taking lessons. I also took singing lessons as a youngster while my family would tell me I was a good singer I knew that this was not my calling. So here I am embarking on learning yet another musical skill, lets hope this one sticks. Below i have a wonderful youtube video that explains some of the different pricing for the many (didn't know they made more than one type) different Ukuleles on todays market. While the pricing is in pounds we can do some quick conversions to get the dollar price tag (currency exchange rate). The Diagram below will also explain some of the basics of Ukulele construction and terminology. Well looks like I have some of the basics information. Now its time for me to go buy a Ukulele and start posting some videos. |