Visit 7: Multiplication

This past week, I made a visit to the school and we all had so much fun! The students have been learning about multiplication this entire month and last week was especially the 8 times tables. I decided to teach the students a song I know called Weevily Wheat, which is a short song that can help children learn any kind of multiplication tables. I also brought in an African squeeze drum so that the children could make their own rhythms during the song. Once we had learned the music, I let the students use the drum one at a time and make up their own rhythms to accompany the song. I was actually surprised and how enthusiastically all of the children responded to the drum. Not only did they all want to play it, they also sang much more confidently when the drum was accompanying them. Since they were excited about the drum, all the students were happy to sing it as many times as I would allow, and so they all memorized the song by heart very quickly. By the time school was out, they all ran into the hall singing the song as they went.

When class started that day, the students all knew their times tables, but they couldn't just spout out the answers. All of them had to think carefully for quite some time before saying what they thought the answer was to any particular times table. Over time, every student learns them better and eventually we all can recite them quickly but by using the arts to teach the multiplication, the students learned them extremely well, and extremely quickly. After class, I quizzed one of the students on the 8 times tables and he knew them the instant I asked. This is the power of using the arts to teach. Regular subjects can become a joy in the lives of students, and these students can also be exposed to music simultaneously.

This is one of the students with the African squeeze drum that I brought in. He showed a lot of interest in drumming and was one of the only students to get the squeeze technique to work. When

the drum is played and squeezed in the exact right way, it gives the performer the ability to warp the timbre of the drum.