The club meets after school one day every week and has about 30 students who attend the jam sessions on a regular basis.
It may be the middle of winter, but inside Van Zant Elementary School last week, families were made to feel like they were on a tropical island.
Families packed the library at Van Zant after school to watch students from the school’s new Ukulele Club dress in Hawaiian-themed clothes and play an array of hits on their stringed instruments.
Whether it was “House of Gold” by Twenty-One Pilots or the theme to Pixar’s short film “Lava,” dozens of students strummed and sang along during their concert.
The Ukulele Club began in October with Van Zant classroom aide Michelle Hack. According to Hack, the club meets after school one day every week and has about 30 students who attend the jam sessions on a regular basis.
Hack said the idea to start the club came after she bought a ukulele for herself for the first time last year in what she describes a “just a fluke.”
After spending a few weeks with the instrument, using music books and videos online to learn how to play, Hack said she got the idea for her club.
With the Ukulele Club, Hack said her goal was to give kids who don’t already play instruments an easy way to have “music in their hands.” Hack and her husband even spent $500 of their own money to purchase and donate 15 ukeles to the school around the end of last spring.
During the summer, Hack said she also entered a contest on Facebook where the top 50 schools that received the most votes would receive 30 ukuleles.
“I harassed friends. I may have lost friends, but it’s OK — we ended up in first place,” Hack said.
As a result of Van Zant’s first-place win, Hack said the school received an even bigger prize and ended up receiving 60 ukuleles.
“We went from 15 little ukuleles to 75,” Hack said.
Although the kids only began playing in October, Hack described their progress as especially impressive. The students don’t take the ukuleles home and get only about 30 minutes actually play the instrument.
“I am impressed … to hear them play, and these are plastic, not high quality ukuleles — it sounds good. I didn’t think they would be quite this good that fast,” Hack said.
One student in the club, fifth grader Paul Miller, said he was enthusiastic about playing instruments and said he had fun playing an instrument he hadn’t played before.
“I love this club and I look forward to it every week,” Paul said. “I like strumming and playing my own ukulele, and I like learning songs.”
Hack said fifth graders such as Paul are also in luck, as DeMasi Middle School also has a club where students can continue to play once they graduate Van Zant.
