4th Grade Crew // Using Experts
Last year, during Module 3, the 4th grade crew studied the American Revolution in order to answer the question: How did the American Revolution and the events leading up to it affect the people in the colonies? For their final products, students were tasked with writing and producing a song that shared a specific perspective about the American Revolution. We started by listening to and analyzing lyrics from Hamilton in order to get an idea of how to share our knowledge about historical events though song.
When it came time to write and produce the songs, we knew we needed an experts help, so we turned to Mr. “Red”. Darrel “Red” Campbell is a local producer, and on his first visit to our class we found out all about what it is like to be a songwriter and produce music. Mr. Red even got our musical brains working by leading us through various activities, such as the “no words rap battle”! During Mr. Red’s next visit, it was time to get to work on our songs. Mr. Red expertly lead us through the process of picking a beat and then writing historically accurate lyrics to go along with the beat. He brought in his own recording equipment and we were amazed by the quality of the sound when we sung using his speakers!
Our expert came back two more times to walk us through the process of refining and editing our lyrics to make sure that song showed everything we knew about the American Revolution while also sounding awesome. We realized that the writing process could be applied to song lyrics, too!
On his final visit, Mr. Red brought all of his professional recording equipment and set-up in our computer lab. One group at a time, students went and performed the songs we had been working on while Mr. Red recorded. We realized that the real artists had to show a lot of perseverance when they record their work -- it took us quite a few tries to get it right!
With the help of an expert, our 4th grade crew was able to produce high quality songs and experience what it’s like to be a songwriter and producer along the way! None of it would have been possible without the expert guidance of Mr. Red, and we are so thankful to all the experts in the DAA community who work to give students authentic learning experiences this one. Check out the QR code to hear an example of one of the songs we produced!