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MUSIC MEDLEY Teaching Conversational English Through Music in Poland By Dorothy Kittaka SAI Music Education Director I was given the opportunity to teach for three weeks in Plock, Poland, which is the Sister City of Fort Wayne, IN. This was my first time in Europe, and I have never taught conversational English to children and adults. All I knew was that I wanted to use music to stimulate their desire to speak the English language. I found that when songs were taught in English, the lyrics were learned very quickly. The challenge was to make sure that the words that they were pronouncing have meaning when used in conversation. I taught children ages 5 to 16, classes with adult teachers and people from the City Council and the community, who wanted to practice their English and improve their aural communication. Dorothy Kittaka wrote a song In Plock, there were several street vegetable about vegetables to teach and fruit markets. I bought 10 different English to Polish students. vegetables and put them on a table and labeled them with their English names. I made up some raise it up when his vegetable words to the tune of "Hot Cross Buns," and they appeared in the song. Through used Kodaly hand signals to learn the melody this body/voice identification of and then the actual vegetables to hold up during the object, they learned the names the song. of the vegetables. I then could "I Love Vegetable Song" by Dorothy Kittaka use other objects to teach more (To the tune of "Hot Cross Buns") vocabulary. (Hand signals to learn melody) After learning the song, one child would pretend to be I love vegetables mi re do do do the seller of the vegetables and I love vegetables mi re do do do the rest of the children would practice their English by being the Green and yellow, red and white customers. Then we would trade do do do do, re re re off where each child could be the I love vegetables mi re do do do clerk at the market. They had to ask for the produce by name and Carrots, leeks and parsley mi mi re re do do ask how much it cost, and the Potatoes, beets and garlic mi mi mi re re do do clerk would have to answer and Cucumbers and celery do do do do re re re pretend to take their money or Beans and onion, too. mi mi re re do credit card for payment. I decided to teach the very I love vegetables mi re do do do young children simple songs in I love vegetables, mi re do do do Green and yellow, Red and white English with body movement, which helped with memory do do do do re re refor the words, songs like: "Hot Cross Buns," I love vegetables mi re do do do "Brother John," "Head and Shoulders," "My As the children sang the song, each child Poor Hand is Shaking," etc. In all, I taught was responsible to hold up the vegetable and about 10 songs. We used the songs to jumpstart discussion in English. With the older students, I introduced musicals, such as the Sound of Music, with songs like "My Favorite Things" to start conversations TEACHING continued on page 26 sai-national.org SUMMER 2012 PAN PIPES 3

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