106 Songs about School

schooling 2 comments

Two weeks ago, in a Canvas course for faculty titled Teaching Online 101, we had a couple of faculty note how students enjoyed creating playlists in their courses. That sounds good, right. They noted Spotify and YouTube as tools to create such things. We figured we’d help other faculty and staff in the class see what those playlists might look like using YouTube. So, we created a playlist for them and let them know through an “announcement” that they could contribute to it if they wished. Exactly no one from the class took us up on our offer.

For a bit, I really did wonder if there were actually any happy songs about school. There are of course, but I was in a particularly foul mood. Well, I just had to share the collaboration link on twitter. Of course.

Most all of the songs, many from Cheryl, were added on a Saturday morning and of course, ds106 hung heavily in the air. My experience of it was walking along a river headed to my dad’s place and watching the list grow. Pretty funny. I was kinda skeptical that we could reach 106. After all, I had wondered if there were any happy songs at all about school. Turns out there are some, but a lot dwell in the less than amazing parts of the schooling experience. Weirdly, the whole thing about 106 reminded me of chickens in boots and the Grand Canyon.

Truthful as they are, not all the songs are all that noble in content. Smokin’ in the Boys Room and Van Halen’s Hot for Teacher may not give us warm fuzzies about our school experience, but they do offer a pretty honest look at the realities of school. They are all added to the playlist as they do represent the multi-dimensional experience that school offers. I think. The whole thing is just very interesting to me.

I am interested just how music can translate into emotion and how most of the emotions around the songs are of love and, well, maybe anger or resentment. Of the latter, Supertramp’s “School” comes to mind. We know emotions are critical to learning and leveraging that, perhaps like making a playlist of songs about _____ is a good idea in any class? These emotions and music are so critical to the human experience. Where are they in our school today?

Anyway, that is how Todd’s idea of asking about a hundred faculty to contribute to a playlist went, and the resulting additions from those friends from afar who all contributed to over a hundred songs about school. You can listen to them below.

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