it was when i shared a song by the old 97's that related to our open court unit 1 theme: cooperation and competition. here are the song's lyrics:
Alone So Far
I watch, as it stops for a girl,
A moment, elaborate and weak.
I am easy in her midst,
Why elaborate, when there's no need to?But I do, all night,
My words ring like money off a bar.
But she's here, asleep now,
One can only go alone so far.One can only go alone so far.
I dream of a deep dark grave,
Seven feet below Saint Augustine.
And she's so easy in her breathing,
Why fall in love, when there's no need to?But we do all night,
One can only go alone so far.
Sleep like spoons, forget whom we are.
But she's here, and she's wound down now.
One can only go alone so far.
after i played the song on my guitar, i talked about how it related to geese that fly in a V formation--they can fly farther, cooperating in a group than they can flying alone. one can only go alone so far.
since we've been studying pronouns, i asked what the rather ambiguous "it" was that "stops" in the first line of the song. i told them i thought "it" could be a car, a bus, a train, maybe time. one of my students raised his hand and set me straight:
i think "it" is his heart.my heart stopped too, when i heard that!
just to recap: today a "teaching moment" occurred when a 10 year-old taught me what a song lyric i showed him could mean!
4 comments:
Why not show them the video of the waterbuffalo, aligator, and lions instead? How far could that little calf have gotten with out its herd?
It is not good to be alone. (Genesis 2:18). The desire to be known by and to know our Creator with heart knowledge is basic to our existence. Maybe the geese and the 10 year old and the Old 97's are on to something.
would that i could access youtube from behind my district's firewall... ::sigh:: so much from which to protect the children, mateo... (i told those who have access at home to check it out!)
Of all the time spent analyzing that song...just another example of the multi-dimensional Rhett Miller.
Cool that you shared that with your kids.
Post a Comment