Towards Musical Intelligence by Converting Upper Primary School Science Text into Rap Lyrics

Dr. Lalit Kishore68-Jai Jawan Colony-3, Jaipur, India

Rap music and lyrics due to their rhythmic structure and folk simplicity are apt for use as musical-pedagogical tools. They can be used to make classroom instruction musical smart and more inclusive.

The following textual material from grade six science book was converted into rap lyric. “Blue whales are the largest animals on earth. They eat lots of shrimp like small animals, called krill’s. They have a big mouth and instead of teeth they have baleen which hang from the upper jaw and look like the teeth of a comb. They gulf sea water and push it out through the baleen thereby, straining the krill to be enjoyed as food later on.”

The following procedure of creating multi-rhymes or multis that are basic to rap lyrics was used to create the rap lyrics based on the above-cited text.

1. The line selected for the chores was “Blue whale are the largest animals living on the earth” and chores (refrain) was created as: The largest animals living on earth (3)/ They are blue whales/Blue whales, blue whales/They are blue whales/The largest’re blue whales/

2. Next, the multis with the last two words of the selected lines ‘on earth’ were created as follows after reading the text and using own vocabulary.

(a) Perfect thymes with ‘earth’: girth, birth, and slant rhymes with ‘earth’: mouth, teeth, eat, baleen.

(b) Perfect (near) rhymes with ‘on’; combSlant rhymes with ‘on; (i) baleen, (ii) lots, tots, jawsBased up the processed information’s on the multis as above, the following rap verse was created.

Couplet Rhyme-1: Largest animals / with lots of girth//Deep sea’s the / place of tots’ birth.

Story- 1. : On the earth / largest animals / blue whales / big mouth / no teeth. Chorus: as cited above.

Couplet Rhyme-2: They love krills / with no teeth jaws on / /On upper jaw,/ they’ve baleen combs

Story- 2. : Comb like teeth / lots of baleen / gulp water / strain krills / good food later. Chorus: as cited above.

Couplet Rhyme-3: (Combination of rhymes and multi rhyme) Big girth /big mouth; / no teeth /but baleen; // Long combs on jaws; / eating krills a lot Chorus: as cited above.

The foregoing example was used as a modeling activity by the teacher as an exposure and demystification the process of creating rap lyrics and their singing.

Since development of musical intelligence is related to writing lyrics, creating music and singing, it was thought to introduce it as a group activity lasting for three lesson-sessions after every on mouth of study course. In order to systematize the activity, it was decided to produce the activity sheets with the following format.

Musical Activity SheetName of the lesson: Text selection : Textbook page No……………

: Paragraph No…………………The text : (At least 100 words)

(a) Selected punch lines /(b) Last two words: First …………………….Second…………………...(c) First word related perfect rhyming words: /(d) First word related last consonant slant rhymes: /(e) First word related vowel sound slant rhymes: /(f) Second word related perfect rhyming words: /(g) Second word related last consonant slant rhymes: /(h) Second word vowel sound slant rhymes:/(i) Couplet rhyme -1: //

Chorus: //

A note for the teacher

The completion of activity sheet be taken up a group work with 3 or 4 members in each group and various groups may be assigned a different page to choose the textual material. After writing of lyrics is over the groups be given one lesion-session to practice its singing with a simple percussions instrumental. Thereafter, the group asked to make quick presentations.

Initially, do not press for quality; slowly music sense develops through self-correction and practice. Keep on rotating the groups so as to de-emphasize competition and those who are better off in music are able to share their talent and make peer-tutoring equitable.