Music and insults

On November 4 2007 · 2 Comments · In Diary

I have now conducted several listening exercised with my group of young adults, all aimed at enhancing their listening skills and understanding of English. This has been accomplished through the use of some of the finest music known to man. So far, we have listened to

  • Lionel Richie – Say You, Say Me
  • Otis Redding – (Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay
  • Abba – Money, Money, Money and Thank You For The Music
  • The Beatles – Yesterday

All nice simple songs. The idea is very simple – write the lyrics to the song on the whiteboard, but miss out a word or so in each line of the song. You play the song once, then see who can fill in the blanks on the whiteboard. They’re getting better. An unexpected result of this listening exercise, which happened when I put the first song on, was that the kids started singing along, and carried on singing after the lesson had finished. It’s a bit surreal when a Cambodian kid is walking around with a big smile on his face singing “Say You, Say Me”.

I’m going to do my best to protect the kids from hip-hop, which in most cases barely resembles English and will confuse the hell out of them. Khmers don’t need to start calling each other bitches and motherf***ers any time soon – the worst insult I’ve had from a local so far is ‘pig’.


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  • http://theanswers42.blogspot.com/ Margaret

    If only we could protect everyone from hip-hop.

  • http://www.amyallcock.com Amy Allccok

    Lovely melange of music to learn English by. I must admit, the thought of Cambodian kids walking around singing Lionel Richie made me laugh. The bizarre cultural mashup reminded me of the little boy I met on the Floating Islands on Lake Titicaca who sang Frere Jacques.