November has come and gone, December is half over. . . it just started to snow! In central Canada, we usually have -50C weather with 3 feet of snow. But lately it has been +10C on average with zero snow. Makes it a little difficult to get into the Christmas spirit, which is completely necessary as a music teacher! We have our concerts coming up (here are the ones my students are doing this year: post, video) and my students made me cry yesterday! The Truth About Me Crying It isn’t exaclty what it sounds like. I have one group of some difficult personality combinations and I have another group that I am always so excited to see. This week we began to run mass group rehearsals. My difficult group were being quite silly and restistant to any direction from the teachers. They were being normal 8-year-olds but for some reason, this year it was just a lot to handle. But they didn’t make me cry. My second group of students had about 75 kids, 20 more than my difficult group. HOWEVER, they were working so hard and they were so excited to sing with their other friends. The innocence of it had me a little emotional but I had held it together. We ran our first block of lines and the first song. Everything was going quite smoothly and the classroom teachers were happy with what they were seeing and hearing. There was a slight technical glitch with my computer so I had gone over to fix it. The next accompaniment track started to play and I wasn’t ready so I was going to restart it. BUT THEN the students all started to sing, made the proper entrance, and then ran two-part harmonies BY THEMSELVES! AND THEY ARE 7! I was so shocked and proud of them. I just sat on my stool and let them finish the song. As they finished the last cue, I could feel my eyes starting to water. I wasn’t going to let my students see me cry but then I thought why not?? They Deserve to Know My students have worked incredibly hard. A part of the music curriculum is understanding effects and uses of music. We could talk about how it should make us feel and as students, I believe that they are telling me the truth about how they feel. As an adult and educator, parts of my job is to act. I need to act like this is the best song I’ve ever heard, or that I’m not sick of teaching the same one over and over again, or that I do love listening to all genres. Sometimes those are true, but sometimes they aren’t real. In the quick instance that I noticed I was tearing up, I decided that they should know how wonderful they are and how amazing it is that they could make music like that! They asked why I had tears so I told them. I told them about how they did something so beautiful and it had an impact on me. I told them that they were happy tears (because that’s a thing, too.) Then I told my students that they were all special. I could see on their little faces how proud and amazed that they were! I Wasn’t Expecting What Happened Next What happened next was amazing and something I completely wasn’t expecting. They started to work even harder! They became even more focused, said their lines with the correct timing, remembered the singing parts and weren’t goofing off. My happy-crying had motivated and inspired them to try that again. Kids are so amazing and resilient. I defintely have always had a special bond with this group as they were my first class of kindergarten students at this school. But now we have something even more precious: these shared musical experiences. I am in awe.
