Note: In a few weeks, my students will read this entry as part of an SOL review project. That is why some of their achievements appear in it. ;)
There are many perks to being a teacher: working with hilarious students/colleagues, creating meaningful lessons, seeing students improve, etc.
One specific perk I get every November is participating in Rock and Cole. In the Rock and Cole project, students create their own mixed CD, matching five characters from the novel Touching Spirit Bear to five songs. (The project gets its name from Spirit Bear’s central character, Cole Matthews.) In the days leading up to the in-class concert, students scour book passages and song lyrics to find things that connect. On concert day, each student analyzes another student’s CD, trying to match the characters, songs, traits, and quotes. It’s also a pretty entertaining day, considering the desks are filled with 30-plus CD players, boom boxes, and headphones, and several students rock out as they work.
The best part for me is that I get to listen to all the CDs. New discoveries this year were B.O.B. / Rivers Cuomo’s “Magic,” Mike Posner’s “Cooler than Me,” Bruno Mars’ “Just the Way You Are,” and Disney’s “Colors of the Wind.” (Ok, so the last one wasn’t a ‘new discovery.’ I had, sadly, heard the Pocahontas song 300 times before.)
Student award winners for this year included:
-- Star Performers CH, LG, AK, AC, MP, NS, SS, IL, ZH, SS, RT, JW, CR, DE, FW, AC, SS, JM, JK, DR, AM, BH, and MV. These students proved they did not need a band or stage to perform. They could rock out in a DESK!
-- Star Reviewers JK, TP, DB, AM, SK, SJ, JK, DM, MS, CL, KW, KM, AG, HT, and ES. These students reviewed their CDs with the precision of professional rock critics. Wonder if Rolling Stone magazine is in any of their futures…
-- Rock Survivors AK and NH. AK and NH should be commended for making it all the way through their CDs, despite multiple CD / headphone debacles.
-- Rock Comics TK, SS, AL, CU, JT, CT, VJ, JW, FO, and CJ. These students should be recognized for filling the concert with funny moments. VJ, TK, AL, and SS, got amusingly angry at how many songs matched Spirit Bear’s main character. All of them asked the same basic question, “I get that Cole is a round, dynamic, three-dimensional character, but does EVERY song have to fit him?” It was also funny hearing CU shriek “most intense string orchestra ever” in the middle of one of his songs, hearing JT shriek “I hate country” after every one of his, seeing CT try to get a addicting out of her head, and seeing VJ and JW flip out after each song on FO and CJ’s CDs. FO and CJ’s CDs prompted further amusement days later when each of the classes heard parts of them at the end of the period. (They were each played on GM's awesome Spongebob boom box.) After hearing all of them play, few students would argue that “I’m a Little Teapot,” Frank Sinatra’s “Happy Birthday,” and “I’m a Gummy Bear” weren’t among the year’s most memorable songs.
-- All students, for making this Rock and Cole the best one in four years. Each year’s concert has been successful (last year’s earned a B+), but this year’s was by far the best. More students submitted full folders than ever before, all students were able to find classmates’ Favorite Word on their folders, and very few students encountered logistical problems. In the end, I think SS and RT said it best: “Couldn’t we listen and learn from music every day?” If only…
Grade: A
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