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Saturday Top Comments: Proud Papa Edition [1]

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Date: 2025-06-28

As you can tell by the cover photo, our district’s Arts program does a summer enrichment program for kids from grades 3-12. This year we had a two week rock band class for high schoolers, a three week band and orchestra class, a four week visual arts class, and a combination three week music theater/choir class with one week of electronic music. This past Thursday was the concert and art show for the band, orchestra, visual arts, and music theater classes. I did the music theater class.

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So I had to come up with a music theater/choir curriculum for mostly elementary students with a time of three weeks—or in reality, ten four hour days. I missed one day because I had to work the high school graduation as the choir director, and there was no school on Juneteenth.

So my first thought was “what to do”? I chose four very easy two part songs from repertoire already in my choir library. Then I asked AI to design a short skit/show around those songs. It spit out a cute thing about the Hero’s Journey. I worked it to use a bit of Godspell improv and audience participation, and I was ready.

Ready? Did I just say that? I was freaking out and my impostor syndrome was kicking in full gear. How am I gonna teach elementary school kids to not only sing on pitch and in harmony, but to do a MUSICAL?

My anxiety immediately called a meeting with my ADHD hyperfocus and my autism symptoms and they all worked out a concept of a plan. And then it was the first day.

And guys, the kids NAILED it. The oldest was going to be a Freshman in the fall, and the youngest was going to be in third grade in the fall. They sang great two part harmony, did the choreography I designed (and the fact that I designed choreo that WORKED is a thing in and of itself), and acted their hearts out. I never had so much fun in my entire life. And THEY loved it too. I raised a whole new bunch of theater kids for our program. I had the help of two of my high schoolers and a recent graduate of mine who herself is pursuing a music education degree.

Here is the program. My stuff is of course “Choir and Musical Theater”.

I went from “how the hell am I going to do this” to “OMG I CAN do this” to “Hell yeah I’m good” in record time. All due to those amazing kids, but I KNOW I taught them a lot and they learned a lot too.

And I can’t say enough about the kids in our district. Underserved areas like Hammond IN get a lot of flack for “failing schools” and all that tripe. And all the negative press about crime and gangs, and whatever. But the kids who live there. THIS is the stuff they CRAVE. They WANT to express themselves. They WANT to show off all they can do. These kids have the talent and the drive to outdo ANY school district. All they need is the opportunity. And these past weeks showed me that I CAN give them that opportunity.

And I really needed that.

Next week is the final week, and I’m going to take them up to my piano lab and have them play with GarageBand and create their own music. I’m betting they’ll do a better job in those four short days than a lot of my high schoolers can do in a semester. AND—the kids are looking forward to auditioning for the fall musical which will be for the elementary/middle school students. AND I’ve also recruited new choir members as well when they come to me in high school. I can’t wait until next summer’s show.

But until then, on to Tops!

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