This week I auditioned about 30 elementary children who wanted a solo in this year’s VBS camp musical. For auditions I announced that students would be singing the first verse of “My Country ‘Tis of Thee” (a standard audition song). I had the drama director demonstrate the song, but the children stared at me blankly. “Perhaps they are nervous,” I thought. Then, the VBS coordinator asked how many children knew that song. Not one child raised their hand! I was horrified! What songs are teachers teaching children in school these days?
In my generation, ”My Country ‘Tis of Thee” was the song that we all learned in grade school. In fact, by third grade in public school I knew the songs: “I’ve been Working on the Railroad,” “My Country ‘Tis of Thee,” “Oh, Susanna,” “This Land Is Your Land,” “Yankee Doodle” (OK, I didn’t live in the South!), “You’re a Grand Old Flag,” “When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again,” “God Bless America” (yes, we actually sang that in public school!), and “America The Beautiful.”
What does this say about our elementary schools? Children who don’t know their own country’s patriotic songs are missing out on a rich part of American history. Library of Congress has a collection of over 3,000 American songs that “presents a significant perspective on American history and culture through a variety of music types…” (http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/award97/ncdhtml/hasmhome.html)
Well, the VBS coordinator that day suggested I choose either Happy Birthday or Twinkle Twinkle Little Star for the audition. I thought, “I am auditioning mostly ten and eleven year olds, not three year olds!” Since Happy Birthday is almost always sung very badly, I chose the latter song as our new audition material, but had to wonder what Memorial Day meant to this handful of elementary students.
In a day when so much of American history is being rewritten with a 21st century mindset, learning an American song helps us better understand the mindset of those before us who valued freedom and were willing to pay a high price for it. (Perhaps that is why American songs are not being taught in elementary schools today. It doesn’t match what is being taught in history class anymore.)
This Memorial Day I hope that we will take a few moments to contemplate our freedom and what it cost thousands of Americans before us. I also hope that we will take time to teach a patriotic song to our children this weekend. This website has several to choose from: http://www.scoutsongs.com/categories/patrioticsongs.html
Yes I will sing patriotic songs with my kids my weekend! Thanks for the challenge and reminder!
Don’t forget Dixie!
“Then, the VBS coordinator asked how many children knew that song. Not one child raised their hand! I was horrified! What songs are teachers teaching children in school these days?”
I teach all grades at an inner city public school made up of predominately welfare and immigrant students.
I have taken it upon myself to teach “Oh, Susannah”, “Skip to My Lou”, “Way Down Yonder in the Pawpaw Patch”, “I’ve Been Working on the Railroad”, “Home on the Range” and a number of other American folk songs to my students. It doesn’t correspond to my subject area, but I know that they will otherwise never learn these songs.
My students sometimes tell me that they go home and sing the songs to grandparents or parents and they are excited to discover that they know the songs too.
Students love the songs and request to sing them time and time again.
Why don’t we teach these more often?
1. Music classes have been widely cut from our schools.
2. Teachers are overwhelmed with curriculum requirements, and many traditional activities we associate with a primary education have been abandoned (at the expense of a rounded education for children). This even includes recess.
3. The political correctness movement has made teachers leery about teaching traditional songs (particularly patriotic ones) for fear of being accused of ethnocentrism or some such thing. Jehovah’s Witnesses and various other religious or ethnic groups have issues with patriotic, holiday or other types of songs.
It is sad because the songs represent a national heritage that binds generations, including new immigrants. Singing is excellent for the developing brain and for language skills.
Singing together builds community and camaraderie.
Sadly, I think that the era of holistic primary education that emphasizes social skills, art, music, poetry, games and other activities is gone. We are left with an educational system trying desperately to meet testing standards by forcing academics onto younger and younger students.
Orchard,
Thank you for sharing your valuable insight, and for teaching your classroom children these songs! I smiled when I read that the children in your classroom get excited when they go home and find out that their parents and grandparents know these songs too.
Since folk music has historically been passed down aurally from one generation to the next I have to ask myself, “why have these children never heard their parents or grandparents sing these songs at home before they learned the songs at school?” Perhaps the burden does not entirely rest on the shoulders of teachers. Singing as a family can provide wonderful memory-making, family bonding time.
Thank you for your musical impact in the lives of the next generation!
“Since folk music has historically been passed down aurally from one generation to the next I have to ask myself, “why have these children never heard their parents or grandparents sing these songs at home before they learned the songs at school?”
Many of their families are plagued with drug and alcohol addiction, domestic violence, promiscuous sexual practices, poverty, poor health, a partying lifestyle, criminal involvement, homelessness and mental illness. I have students in foster care or who are being raised by extended family. Some of my students don’t get sleep at night, and fall asleep at school during the day. Some of them don’t get enough to eat, while the parents drink or party. Some kids have heard every obscene rap lyric imaginable, but are completely ignorant of traditional children’s songs.
It’s sad.