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| Program encourages creativity through songs |
Kathy Hussey works with third-graders at Patrick Henry Elementary School on Wednesday during the Kid Pan Alley program in which singer-songwriters help students create original works. (Bulletin photo by Mike Wray) |
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Thursday, January 14, 2010
By ELIZA WINSTON - Bulletin Staff Writer
If children wrote every song on the radio, what would the lyrics be about? At Patrick Henry Elementary School on Wednesday, the answer was everything from recess to pizza to eating dirt in science class.
Singer-songwriters with the Kid Pan Alley children’s songwriting project are holding workshops this week for third- and fourth-graders at the school. Kathy Hussey and Paddy Dougherty are teaching students to write original songs that will be performed in concerts Friday for the student body and parents.
The project, sponsored by Piedmont Arts Association, the Harvest Foundation and others, is designed to help children express their ideas in song while building self-confidence, according to a news release.
On Wednesday, Alicia Diaz’s third-grade class got a chance to create its own song. Hussey, of Nashville, explained to the students that first, they had to decide on a topic. Normandy Evans, 9, suggested, “I am a third-grader.”
The class decided to go with the theme of third grade, and Hussey told students they would brainstorm every word they could think of to describe being in third grade to create lyrics for the song’s chorus.
“What kinds of things do you like about being in third grade?” Hussey asked.
Dougherty, who is based in Lynchburg, wrote down the answers, one of which was about science projects.
“And why do you like science projects?” Hussey inquired.
“Because today we ate dirt!” the students exclaimed.
Diaz explained that the students learned about the layers of soil with a demonstration made from cookie crumbs, pudding and gummy worms.
“And then we ate it,” several kids said. This led to brainstorming about lunch, pizza and the candy students received if they got 100 percent on an assignment.
The students continued brainstorming until Hussey told them they were ready to create a chorus. Some students, such as Normandy, were used to song structure. Normandy said she often practices singing on her own and has even written her own songs.
Others, such as Anthony Ballard, 8, never had created a song before. Anthony said he enjoyed the class, but he wasn’t sure if he would write a song by himself in the future.
Even if Wednesday’s class didn’t create 22 future songwriters, it helped teach students the basics of music construction, including a new vocabulary. Hussey explained that a chorus is the part of a song that has the title, is repeated often and holds the song’s main idea. She asked the class what the other component of a song is, hinting that it starts with a “v.”
The class broke out into a chorus of “Vs,” trying to sound out the unknown word.
“Vulture?” a student ventured, but Hussey replied that the word she was looking for was “verse.” However, first students had to create a chorus.
With guidance from the songwriters, the class came up with this:
“We are third grade, and this is our song/We are third grade; we like to sing along/We think we’re always right and we are never wrong/We are third grade, and this is our song.”
After Hussey sang it once with her guitar, the entire class sang while Dougherty recorded it. The verses are to be written in another workshop today.
The students will be given recordings of the song to take home and practice before they perform for the school on Friday. At 6:30 p.m. that day, parents will be invited to Patrick Henry for a second performance.
According to the news release, Kid Pan Alley was founded in Rappahannock County in 1999, and it has created and performed 1,500 songs with some 25,000 elementary school children in communities across the country.
Additional supporters of the workshops are the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Mellon Arts in Education Statewide Program and the Patrick Henry PTO. |
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