HOT TOPIC: Song Lyrics
Volume 2, Issue 21 - February 12, 2006"The power of music in the classroom is rarely harnessed to make use of its full potential. From its emotive auditory range to its depth of lyrical meaning, music can transform an ordinary lesson into a significant learning experience. With everything we know today about the different ways we learn, what teacher wouldn’t want to add music to his or her repertoire of instructional strategies?
In particular, consider the power of the musical lyric, be it from a past era in history or currently on the top of the charts. The song lyric as poetry can be a powerful approach to immersing students in colorful, descriptive language, vivid imagery, and uses of expression such as metaphor, simile and allegory which are understood so much more when experienced meaningfully within the context of powerful verse.
In my fourteen years of teaching, I used music at every grade level with whom I worked, from Kindergarten through high school. The ways in which music and song energized my classroom and enticed my students to want to know more made me come back to this rich source of curriculum content over and over again. Consider applying map skills and world geography through Enya’s Orinoco Flow, immersing students in the social revolution of the mid-and-late 1900s through Billy Joel’s We Didn’t Start the Fire (you also must check out http://home.uchicago.edu/~yli5/Flash/Fire.html), or discovering the artists and writers behind the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band cover.
Enough said. From popular music to our folk heritage, enjoy this weeks D12!"
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