In this post, I am going to talk about my experiences with the group Bridges and how we brought music to all different ethnic groups on thanksgiving international christian student society. Below I have included links to their Be Involved page on JMU’s official club site, I also linked their constitution so you can read more about what they specifically do. How we started this and established contact is we reached out to multiple clubs on campus, bridges came back to us within a few days and told us we could do something at their thanksgiving dinner coming up. We then began by sharing information and documents about what we do and what they do and how we can both make this work. After talking over computers for awhile, a team of us met up in person to discuss logistics to figure out how we are going to order the event. Talking about if they should eat first, and how much time we will be given. Also thinking about what song we would like to teach them. As we figured out the Thankfulness Song from Veggie Tales was based on thanksgiving and performed in a famous Christian cartoon Veggie Tales. We then decided we wanted to give them a chance to do something on their own with the instruments so we added in a section where we would write songs about thanksgiving with them. After that it would be a wrap, and they would probably want to go home. WE NEVER ACTUALLY WROTE AN EXPERIENCE DESIGN BECAUSE WE WERE NOT REALLY SURE IF WE WOULD HAVE TO WITH THIS. IF WE DID WRITE ONE I THINK THE BIGGEST BARRIER THAT WE HAD TO OVERCOME WAS SPEECH, ALL OF THEM SPOKE ENGLISH BUT SOME OF THEM WERE SOFT SPOKEN AND SLOW SPEAKERS. SO IT WAS IMPORTANT TO MAKE SURE IF ANYBODY HAD ANY QUESTIONS BEFORE WE STARTED STRUMMING WE ANSWERED THEM, AND STOPPING IF ANYBODY WAS TALKING. I HAD TO DO A LOT OF CALL AND REPEAT OR MIRRORING ME JUST WITH FINGERINGS AND WITH STRUMMING PATTERN, THAT ALL SEEMED TO BE THE BEST ADAPTATION IN THIS SITUATION. AS IT HAPPENED WE HAD THE OPPORTUNITY TO SHARE A THANKSGIVING MEAL WITH ALL OF THEM, WE EVEN HAD OUR OWN TABEL. WE COULD TELL THEY WERE VERY MUCH LOOKING FORWARD TO THE EXPERIENCE, SO WE KNEW WE COULDN'T LET THEM DOWN ON THAT. AS WE FINISHED EATING, OUR GROUP STOOD UP AND INTRODUCED OURSELVES TO ALL OF THEM. THEY SEEMED READY TO JAM SO WE PERFORMED THE SONG FOR THEM REAL QUICK SO THEY KNOW WHAT IT SOUNDS LIKE, THEN WE BROKE UP INTO PODS OF DIFFERENT INSTRUMENTS THAT EACH OF US INDIVIDUALLY RAN. SO WE TOOK SOME TIME APART TO LEARN HOW TO PLAY OUR INDIVIDUAL INSTRUMENTS AND CHORDS. AFTER AWHILE WE CAME BACK TOGETHER AND PUT IT ALL TOGETHER TO PERFORM AT LAST. IT WAS FUN AND THEY WERE REALLY INTO IT. THEN THE REAL FUN STARTED, WE HAD THEM ALL GROUP UP RANDOMLY WITH OTHER INSTRUMENTS, SO THEN WE ALL FLOATED AND HELPED GROUPS WRITE SONGS. WE COULD TELL SOME OF THEM WERE A LITTLE SCARED AND WORRIED ABOUT MESSING UP, I EVEN HAD SOMEBODY IN ONE OF THE GROUPS I WAS HELPING TELL ME THEY WILL NOT PERFORM NO MATTER WHAT. HOWEVER, I ENDED UP HELPING THIS GROUP WRITE A PRETTY FUN TUNE AND EVEN THE INDIVIDUAL WHO TOLD US SHE WILL NEVER PERFORM WANTED TO PLAY IT FOR EVERYBODY ELSE, NO CONVINCING NEEDED, SHE WANTED TOO. I HAVE VIDEOS OF THAT PERFORMANCE AS WELL FOR THIS POST SO I WILL PUT THOSE BELOW. DURING OUR CLEANUP WHEN WE ALL WERE PRETTY HAPPY WITH HOW IT WENT AND WHAT WE HAVE DONE, ONE OF THE INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS CAME UP TO ME AND ASKED ME WHERE SHE COULD OBTAIN MORE OPPORTUNITIES TO JAM ON INSTRUMENTS LIKE THE GLOCKENSPIEL. LATER THAT WEEK I WAS ABLE TO GET HER INTO CONTACT WITH THE DIRECTOR OF THE STEEL DRUM BAND, I BELIEVE SHE IS NOW ENROLLING FOR IT THIS COMING SPRING. THIS WAS MY FAVORITE INTERACTION AT BRIDGES BECAUSE I REALLY DID OPEN THIS PERSON'S LIFE TO MORE MUSIC AND I CAN PHYSICALLY ALREADY SEE THAT HAPPENING. As I talk and reflect on this as a teacher I think about what this helped me with the most. I know being a teacher we have to work with a wide variety of ethnic groups, and this gave me an opportunity to do that a little here. I thought i was going to be much harder than it was but music really does just naturally bring people together. Its amazing seeing what I can do with just a few instruments and some free time, these people loved having the chance to play together and we brought that. I also learned a lot about working in a group of teachers, this will be useful for things when I have to help run a school musical if their are other music teachers or a visual art teacher etc. It also shows me with more hands you can do things like this easier and just make people's day with music. In the end we all still love music, and music still appeals to everybody. Update: We wrote an experience design
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