Submitted by Louise Eddington, Muncie, Indiana
Idea posted February 22, 2005
Musical Trip Around the World
Grades 5-8
The students were told one day, totally by surprise, that they were going on a round-the-world trip. They needed to bring good listening skills, a pencil, and some paper. I used a cassette tape I had compiled (more details about this below) which had ten selections. Each of the selections was very nationalistic in style and easily identifiable. The students were told that for each stop on the trip, the ONLY clue they would have as to where they had arrived was the music they heard playing on the sound system in the airport. There were no signs and no other clues. They were to listen to the music and, for each selection, write their response to, "Where in the world are you?" and more importantly, "What did you hear in the music that made you think so?" There were no right answers, but just good listening and good reasoning to make intelligent guesses. Once the tape started, they needed to write their answers while the music played, but they also had a minute or so between selections.
Details of the tape were:
#1) "On The Trail" from Grand Canyon Suite - On this one, the instructions were a bit different, "Tell me what part of the U.S.A. you think we're leaving from." Most kids would pick up on the "clip-clop" rhythm indicating a horse, and answers were usually about a cowboy or out west somewhere.
#2-9) These songs were very nationalistic and only instrumental. The selections included: African drum rhythms; a Japanese Koto song; Hawaiian music with the electric guitars; a Spanish bullfight march with castanets and rhythms typical of Spanish music; a Swiss polka; and a few others. The important factor is choosing things that SOUND like the students' idea (based mostly on TV and movies, rather than real life travel) of what that country's music might sound like.
#10) The last one was Sousa's "Stars And Stripes Forever." Almost everyone responded with "back home in the good old U.S.A., 4th of July," etc.
Grading this is very subjective, therefore somewhat difficult, since there were no right answers. I believe this is a good lesson to introduce musical styles of many different world cultures.