Show and Tell

Character Education programs come in two flavors: showing and telling.

Showing is most often used by storytellers. In this style of teaching, a character goes through an experience and subsequently learns a life-changing lesson. These types of tales capture an audience’s attention because they remind us of ourselves, our families or the situations we experience. They do so by creating a moving picture that draws us into the action, even when we know what will happen next. Our preK-2nd grade assembly, “The Golden Rule Show”, includes three of these story-songs: “I Don’t Want to Go to Bed Right Now”, “The Rainbow Fish” and “Little Bunny and Red Bird”. What unites these stories is the time-honored tactic of using drama to teach, instead of preach, and remind us of the values we hold dear in our communities. As Mary Poppins might sing, stories are a “spoonful of sugar to help the medicine go down.”

Just like the creators at Disney, Beth and I mix music and humor into all of our school programs with the expressed purpose of drawing kids toward us and making learning fun. Do kids know that they are learning about good listening, following the rules, conflict resolution and making good choices in “The Golden Rule Show”? Most do, but we reinforce our point by using songs and dialogue that tell, too.

Telling is more fact-based or editorial in nature. For example, the opening verse in “Do the Right Thing,” our 3rd-6th grade show, gives kids the straight scoop without the ornamentation of a story:

Whether someone’s watching you
Or even when they’re not
That’s the time you’ve got to show
The character you’ve got
For everybody has a choice
It’s called ‘the inner voice’
It always guides you to the truth
And that’s the bravest choice
“Do the Right Thing!” by S. Bierko/B. Bierko

Some lessons are so important that we deliver them without subtlety or humor (think U2 or Bob Dylan, here). What saves us from being preachy, however, and being “tuned out” by the older children is the use of music, especially music that pulls them in emotionally. Rock and folk, our two favorite writing styles, work well when we want to express a powerful message that might move children to change their behavior. Whether it’s a power-chord anthem like “Do the Right Thing” or a folk-ballad like Bob Blue’s “Courage”, we’re using the marriage of music, lyrics and an emotionally-charged performance to encourage children to stand up for themselves, their friends and create a more just world.

In our seventeen years of writing and performing children’s music, we have found that a mixture of showing and telling works best for an arts-in-education assembly. A story song or a dramatic piece that invites children to join us on stage is often followed by dialogue that makes clear the lessons learned for anyone who might have missed the point. That’s the “tell them what you’re gong to tell them, tell them and then tell them what you told them” philosophy made manifest in a Beth & Scott show.

As our shows progress, we challenge the children with deeper ideas because we have gained their trust through humor, music and interactivity. I think that’s why people refer to us as master teachers. I prefer the term, “teaching artist.” Teaching artists use their art form to promote the school curriculum, the arts and, in our case, to encourage children, teachers and staff to agree to a common set of values, namely: treating one another with respect and acting responsibly. I accept that we may be masterful at this type of teaching, but there’s one last point to consider…

It takes more than skill to capture an eight or twelve year old’s attention when only two hours before they were snug as a bug in their beds or playing a wild game of dodge ball. The show and the songs must resonate with what they are working on in their lives in order to strike the right chord. A great school show isn’t great because of its special effects, costumes or sets. A great school show must be worthy of pulling the students out of their classroom. That’s why our character education shows are full of honest feelings, perhaps the best and truest form of currency when trying to motivate another person. As an acting coach once said, “you cannot ask your audience to feel what you don’t feel yourself.”

Like the children in front of us every day, Beth and I remember the sting of being left out by our friends. When we write our shows, we “walk a mile” in a fourth grader’s shoes so that we can remember how frustrating it felt to be caught up in an argument without the means to talk things out and make everything better. If we can say one thing in our shows to help them, then we’ve done our job for that day.

Most teachers I’ve met feel called to the profession because they want to “be the change you want to see in the world” (M. Gandhi). For us, it was a desire to merge our love of music, a talent we are forever grateful for, with values that our parents and teachers have passed on to us. Ever since we were kids, we have been following an insistent “inner voice” that has brought us to where we are today as a married couple, as parents and as teaching artists. Along the way, we developed our own method of performing that combines showing and telling and works pretty well for school kids. Hey, some things we learn in kindergarten are the things we use all life long!

For information about "The Golden Rule Show", "Do the Right Thing!" or any of our shows, please contact us at info@bethandscott.net or (800)364-5381.

Darkness is Your Candle

But what shadow has been serving you!
What hurts you, blesses you.
Darkness is your candle.
Your boundaries are your quest.
- Rumi from Enough Words

A couple of weeks ago, I learned an extremely powerful technique that has helped me deal with one of my most debilitating fears. It's applicable to any situation, but for the sake of an example, I'll use it with my fear of Open Mic Nights. (Lately, I've been writing music for grownups, so I've been showcasing these new songs at bars and other places that host these "cattle calls".) The technique can be applied to any situation, however, that you may find full of terror.

It's really quite simple:

STEP ONE (Creating Darkness) I imagine that I'm walking into the venue where the Open Mic is taking place. Next, I try to fully feel all of the fear. In my case, I name things like "I feel out of place and uncomfortable". Then I picture myself waiting to go onstage and becoming progressively more anxious about what I'm going to play, how I'll be received and what I'll sound like. Lastly, I'll see myself onstage and try to create in my heart and in my mind all of the worst feelings that I can muster up.

STEP TWO (Creating Light) I imagine the same scenario with a contrary set of emotions. In my case, I use the word "comfort". I imagine that I'm walking into the venue and it looks and feels like a place where I want to be. I feel very at home and say things to myself like, "It's great to be here!" Then, I imagine the anticipation of going onstage with a feeling of inner joy and harmony with my surroundings. As I step onstage and look at the audience, I drink in the moment and smile because I am where I want to be - singing my wonderful songs as best as I can to an audience who wants to feel passionately connected to great music, too.

STEP THREE (Alternating Darkness and Light). Immediately after step two, I return to step one by creating the fear in my belly, again. Once I'm fully feeling the fear, I return to the same scenario with the comfort. Back and forth I go, shortening the time between fear and comfort but always fully feeling it before moving on.

STEP FOUR (Simultaneous Darkness and Light). The final part is to feel both emotions at the same time. Absolute terror and joyful comfort coexisting in the same moment in time.

The important thing here is to FEEL as if the situation were occurring during this exercise. If you usually get moist palms, then try to create that feeling. The way it was explained to me is this: if we really want to explore, understand and deal with our fear, then we first learn to deal with them in a comfortable place like our own living room. Oftentimes, it does no good to repeatedly put oneself into the real situation because we haven't learned the way to control our emotions, yet.

Over time, I hope to apply this technique out in the "real world" and find that the fear I imagined and felt is no longer perceived as strange and unwelcome. Instead, it will become a known entity, an emotion I understand. I haven't tried it, yet, but I hope that I will be able to move as seamlessly between emotions at my next Open Mic Night as I would in the quiet of my own home.

I hope this technique brings you the courage to walk towards what you are afraid of - not with an absence of fear but a fuller acceptance of that emotion AND the belief that you can feel cleansed by it, too.

Doing the Right Thing

I haven't written in this space in almost two years. During that time, my wife and I have staged two new children's shows: Do the Right Thing (a character education piece for upper elementary) and Beth & Scott's Nutrition Mission. I'm very proud of these two pieces. They are examples of us taking what's often referred to as "The Teacher's Seat"and being very honest with children and teachers. Our values and our vulnerabilities are both on display and I feel very good about that.

Most of my writing energy, however, has been spent composing new songs for grownups. Truth is, I never dreamed about being a children's artist when I was a kid. I wanted to be a singer-songwriter or a rock star. So, now I've now got to the point where I have close to 20 tunes and I'm beginning a new career while maintaining my job as a children's artist. I play one night per week at a local restaurant where I combine my originals with cover tunes from 6-9pm. For the most part, I'm enjoying the experience, though I've recently begun to feel ill at ease when I perform too many cover tunes.

That's not entirely accurate. When I perform for kids my goal is to reach them and teach them. I am expert at controlling the 45-minute experience so that they take a "ride" with me. With grown-ups, however, I feel like I don't want to spend my energy trying to get them to go somewhere. A cover tune is like saying, "Hey, notice me noticing you! I know you love "Brown Eyed Girl" and I'll play it so that you can tap your feet and remember where you were in 1975." I guess I'm saying that I don't want to lead people on a Magical "History" Tour of the 60's and the 70's. Been there and done that, friends.

This is not a finished thought, today. I'm struggling with the needs and wants of the audience and the bar owner versus my desire to connect and play my new tunes. I'm not so sure I want to settle for a balance between the two. I'm not doing this to earn money, so I don't have to be beholden to the almighty dollar. But do I have an obligation to the audience? And what is it exactly? Am I an artist or an entertainer? Don't rush to answer that question with "both" because that's too easy. Think about your favorite musician and wonder, does he or she play cover tunes? Yes, they play their famous songs over and over and that's a drag sometimes. But I know from playing my children's tunes that playing what the audience wants if it's my tune is a lot better than when they ask for something that I haven't written.

I think that this is about the guts to stand up for what I know is right for me. All too often (in the grownup music world), I have bent to the needs of the many and forgotten my own needs as as an artist. I have to stop doing that. As one of my friends said, "You try things out and then see if you can sleep at night." Well, now I know. I realize that I'm on a track where I'll be playing my songs more and cover songs less.

As I said earlier, one of my new kids' shows is called, "Do the Right Thing". That lesson applies to me, too!