Making a Class Playlist

The teacher starts by asking what kind of music students would like to listen to during working periods in class. This will elicit a variety of suggestions, some of which may not be appropriate for the class. How do we choose which ones we add to our playlist? Choose a song or two to examine as a class, using the information from the site below. 

Objective:

To discuss criteria for rating music as explicit or inappropriate*.

To apply rating criteria to popular songs they know.

You Ask, We Answer: 'Parental Advisory' Labels -- The Criteria And The History : The Record : NPR - This site provides information on how songs are rated - deemed explicit or clean. NPR stands for National Public Radio.

Key Questions: 

What is the message of this song? 

Who is it written for? 

What would determine whether it's appropriate or inappropriate and why? 

What should we set as our classroom guidelines for choosing music? 

Key Vocabulary: explicit, clean, appropriate vs. inappropriate, criteria, rating.

Composition#1: 

Have each student choose one song (from a selection of current music that you, the teacher, have vetted) to research - what is the message, who is the composer, and who is the song intended for? 

Discussion: 

What did you discover about the music you have chosen? Were you surprised by what you learned and why? Were the lyrics what you thought they were?

Composition#2: 

The class will create a set of guidelines that will allow them to choose appropriate music for a class playlist. Afterwards, the class playlist can be compiled based on their approval.

The outcomes for this lesson are linked to the following in the New ELAL curriculum (Grade 4) but are applicable for Division II students:

*Organizing idea: Text comprehension is supported by applying varied strategies and processes and by considering both particular contexts and universal themes.

Knowledge: Summarizing information involves determining key ideas and specific details, logically ordering ideas, and paraphrasing.

Synthesizing can create new understandings through a combination of background knowledge and new information from a text.