Our plan
In the late 1990's, middle-school teacher John Chase began to notice that his students weren't connecting with the subject of history quite like they used to. So Chase did some thinking. After a bit of brainstorming, he remembered an assignment that he'd had as a high schooler — an essay analyzing Bruce Springsteen's 1975 song "Jungleland." Chase had really enjoyed writing that essay, because it'd allowed him to mix a personal passion (music) with the traditional english essay. Then Chase thought about the role of pop music in the modern classroom — it wasn't anywhere to be found. Not only were pop songs not used as academic materials, but students were constantly being forced to turn off their Walkmans and CD players in class. An idea began to form in the teacher's head — what if he could teach history with the assistance of pop music lyrics? Chase decided to create a workbook of thematic pop music lyrics for his own classroom use and to help other teachers follow in his footsteps. To make it easier to convince artists to give permission to reprint their words, Chase formed a nonprofit organization called M.U.S.I.C. devoted to promoting arts integration in the classroom through the study of pop music. Right off the bat, the teacher realized that there were legal hurdles that he wouldn't be able to handle himself — so he enlisted the assistance of the organization Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts (VLA), who helped Chase acquire reprinting permission from a wide variety of artists, including Rush, Metallica, Public Enemy and Billy Joel. With the organization established and the workbook coming together, Chase knew things were headed in the right direction.
What we did
While M.U.S.I.C. printed its first few lyrics workbooks, Chase began to use music in the classroom, asking students to analyze lyrics of songs like Arrested Development's "Mr. Wendal." According to the introduction of M.U.S.I.C.'s first workbook, students recognized complexity in the issue of homelessness by analyzing the lyrics to "Mr. Wendal," which deal with the nature of being without food or shelter and introduce questions about modern society's excessive waste. Over time, Chase began to introduce more complex assignments into his curriculum, asking students to, for example, create visualizations of songs or build art pieces representing significant historical events and present them along with pieces of popular music they felt was relevant. As the internet gained popularity worldwide, Chase moved the M.U.S.I.C. program online, offering teachers everywhere access to his teaching materials. Recently, Chase and his students started a MySpace page that allows them to interact with musicians they've studied in class.
Our results
Students are again fully engaged in history and eager to learn more. They are particularly eager to interact with musicians, so Chase has adapted his teaching style to allow more person-to-person contact with artists across the world. One songwriter recently challenged the students to complete artwork for his upcoming tour — another sends messages back and forth with individual students, discussing issues raised in her own songs. Soon, Chase and his students will be working on their own music videos for Matchbox Twenty’s song "How Far We’ve Come." It's a busy time for M.U.S.I.C. students. All in all, Chase's work in the classroom and with the M.U.S.I.C. program has been a grand success, not only getting his students to focus on their studies, but also in improving their ability to analyze content at a deeper level. And most importantly, Chase feels a deeper connection with his students when he's teaching with music. He is quick to paraphrase Maya Angelou, noting the poet's belief that "people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” It's the feeling that Chase is striving for, and so far he's been successful.
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