Feel the shake, shake, steady of the soul to a flame

I'm going to attempt to post my example illustration for Everday America because I'm really proud of how it turned out.

Today I taught writing and I introduced my 5th graders to their next topic. It's what is your favorite singer? I'm having them talk about how long they've liked them, how they discovered them, what's their favorite song by that artist and why, and why the artist is their favorite. To go along with them picking their favorite song, I'm going to have each of them print out the lyrics and then illustrate the song to go with it and we're going to display them all on the wall. I was so excited about this topic and was hopeful that they'd be excited too.

I started out by playing a song from my Live on the Inside DVD and chose Everyday America since that was the one I chose as my favorite song to give an example as if I were doing the assignment too. As soon as it started a bunch of the kids were like OMG! It was really cool. They were all watching the screen and I was glad to see them all paying attention...although you can't not pay attention to Jenn and Kristian lol After I stopped it halfway through, I asked if anyone knew who that was. Half the class's hands shot up and I told them to call it out together. They were like SUGARLAND! And then Isabella and Mason started singing Joey haha I loved it. The more I described the assignment, the more excited some of them got. I think I overwhelmed them a little at first explaining the lyrics and illustration part but after I answered some questions I think they felt better about it.

Isabella's writing about Reba, and she and I started singing Strange when she told me her choice. Martha, Rachel and Leah are doing Carrie, but then Marth and I started singing Consider Me Gone haha Alicia, Elizabeth and Taylor are doing Taylor,and again we had a sing along. Stephanie's doing that new girl who I've seen on GAC/CMT Laura Bell Bundy. Payton's doing Kelly which I was thrilled about haha When she was picking her favorite song, she was picking stuff off All I Ever Wanted, which I was impressed with. She was explaining what the songs were to me and how they were off her newest album and she was so into telling me like I didn't know that I just couldn't correct her haha I did tell her though that I knew all the words too and she smiled.

Mason's doing Lady Gaga. Garrett's doing Alabama. Braden's doing Kansas. Colton's doing Elvis. Nathan's doing Nickelback. Tim's doing Third Day, which I thought was really cool. Kross is doing Hollywood Undead. Connor's doing Keith and I definitely gushed over that one. Of course when he asked me for titles of his songs because he couldn't remember the name of his favorite I completely blanked and wished I'd had my iPod in my purse. Jared's doing Rodney Atkins. Naomi's doing Justin Bieber. Perry's writing about his favorite video game because he doesn't really watch TV/listen to music on his farm and McKinley and Josh are doing authors because they don't listen to music.

The next time we work on these I might sneak on some more Sugarland. I was seriously excited that over half my class knew who they were and were excited about it. Not to mention they knew the words to the songs. The rest of my day wasn't the greatest, but I had a lot of fun with that and I hope that if/when I get a real job I can continue to incorporate Sugarland, Kelly, Little Big Town, etc :)