TESOL 2012 Highlights: Day 1, Part 3

Session 3 and 4

Music in English Language Teaching: A Fun and Functional Duet, presented by Sandra Prytherch

Notes of Music for Pronunciation, presented by Catherine Moore

The use of music in ELT seems to be a hot topic this year. Yesterday alone I found two sessions addressing the practical application of music in the language classroom.

Making her TESOL debut, Sandra Prytherch packed a full house and opened up her session with a warm-up activity of improv music. Participants had yet to even speak to one another, but those with various percussion instruments in their hands followed Sandra’s lead and added their “voices” to the music by accompanying Sandra, who played on a wooden flute. She explained how such improvisation is a metaphor for social construction. For instance, nonverbally participants were finding their roles and making sense of the balance of power. Sandra, the presenter and teacher in this context, was sharing power. In short, such music activities an help establish community. Students hesitant to give any kind of musical performance in class could be invited to listen first and then perhaps add rhythm by clapping. The students must be comfortable, and feeling the rhythm of music is a start.

Sandra offered different ways music could be used in a language lesson, from practicing pronunciation features to serving as a prompt for a writing activity. Sandra has generously posted her material online for teachers to refer to.  A participant added another online resource worth considering: Flocabulary – Educational Hip-Hop.

Later the same day Catherine Moore of California State University offered more ideas on how music could enhance language teaching. She promoted the use of music for many of the same reasons as Sandra, and she also highlighted the fact that popular songs can offer a number of positive features, such as less complexity of information, rhyming, connected speech, and a slower rate of speech.

Catherine performed a labor of love and shared a thick handout including a long list of popular songs which lend themselves to certain language points. For instance, Ed Lipton’s Spelling Song and Barenaked Ladies’ Crazy ABCs. (You can find copies online.) Catherine ended  her session by highlighting some of the more useful apps out there for music: Shazam, Sound Hound, and Pandora.

Thank you to both presenters!

Bringing Music into the Classroom

Music is a powerful medium. Why not bring it into the classroom? While we shouldn’t attempt to turn an English grammar presentation into an aria, we can certainly use music to aid our instruction. For example, in a past entry I presented the activity Cinematic Collocations, in which students’ creativity is stimulated by an excerpt from a film soundtrack, and then in groups they use targeted vocabulary to write a film plot. Here are three additional ways to use music in the classroom:

• Listening/ Pronunciation.  Choose a song that targets sounds or clusters of sounds you’ve practiced in class. The lyrics to Elvis Presley’s Heartbreak Hotel are full of words with /l/ and /r/, a common difficulty for Asian speakers in particular. As a class, listen once. Pass out the lyrics and review them. Listen again. Practice pronunciation. Listen a third time and encourage students to sing along. Need a slower and more clearly sung song? Try Elvis’s Can’t Help Falling in Love with You. There’s plenty of opportunity to practice /l/.
• Listening/ Grammar. Songs illustrate meaningful use of grammar. Have you just covered modal verbs? Do students need more exposure to modals used in the past? Try listening to a song like Beverley Knight’s Woulda Coulda Shoulda. The lyrics are online, and the video is on YouTube.  Give students a copy of the lyrics with all the modal verbs omitted. Their task is to fill in the blanks. Let them work together and give them a chance to hear the song at least twice. When the lyrics are complete, listen a final time.
• Listening/ Writing/ Conversation. From country ballads to Broadway hits, there are songs that tell powerful stories. Let your students listen to one and then have them write down a summary of what they heard. You can try Tracy Chapman’s Fast Car for this exercise. Ask: “Why is this song titled Fast Car? What is she singing about?” Once the summaries are written, students can compare their interpretations. Identify the main theme(s) of the song and discuss the problems the artist sings about.