BornToGroove: Teaching Drumming at the Village Freeschool

I thought I'd take a moment to report to the BTG community about my experience teaching drumming last week.

With some trepidation, I was following up on a visit from my Dad (Charlie) to my daughters' school. My dad came in and taught some dumbek, salsa and samba parts to a few Village Freeschoolers and a teacher and a parent that were there. Being freeschool there was no coercion for kids (or grownups) to participate, so kids drifted in and out while a core of a few more interested kids stayed through the majority of the lesson. My daughter Angelika stayed the whole time.

The hour resulted in a couple OK grooves for a group of first timers. We got a slow samba and a slow salsa going with some success. So, for my stint I thought I'd come in and review what my dad taught them and see where it led us.

In the back of my mind though, an idea had formed over the week between the sessions. I was wondering if instead of coming in and “teaching”preordained rhythms to the kids maybe we'd be better off if I just sort of facilitated the kids own rhythmic explorations. I wasn't sure if this was my own lack of confidence in my hand drumming and rhythm teaching skills or based on the principles that I was learning about freeschooling. I could come in, I was thinking, with my doumbeks and a conga and a basket of shakers, bells and scrapers and just introduce them to the kids. If anyone asked I could show them the “proper way” to hold the instruments and how to hit them. I could draw the line if anyone was going to damage anything. If anyone asked me if I knew any rhythms, I'd be prepared to show them what little I knew.

Anyway, when it came time for the day of my “lesson” I chickened out. I went with the straight up “let's play some salsa”, “OK, now play this beat” approach. The “sage on the stage” instead of the “guide on the side”. Sure enough, slowly the kids peeled off from the group one by one. Eventually even the grownups that were there left the room too, until I found myself staring at my daughters. We'd gotten a few rhythms going and I'd managed to “teach” a few things to a few people, but ultimately I felt a bit defeated. I don't think I have the charisma and decades of experience doing this that my father brings that can keep people as focused for as long.

I decided to pack it in, but first I left the room to fix a computer in the library that was having some problems. About five minutes later my youngest daughter came rushing into the library, very excited. “They're drumming! They need you!” I thought to myself as I went back to the activity room “If they're finally drumming, maybe they don't really need me.” Sure enough when I got to the room a group of about ten kids of various ages were playing drums, banging on bells, blowing penny whistles and maybe even talking to each other. A couple “teachers” were there too. Everybody just kindof doing their own thing-together. It was very polyrhythmic, to say the least.

I thought about staying out of the room and just letting them play their “free school beat”, but I noticed something about what they were playing that drew me in. To my ear it sounded a bit like the Mbuti pygmies. There was the chaos, sure. One teacher refered to it as “cacophony”, but I was hearing several different beats going at the same time with a tripletty pulse anchoring the beat somewhere in the middle. I grabbed the free conga and played the steady alternation-of-hands, triplet 6/8 pattern that I've played so many times before - to reinforce what I was hearing. R-L-R-L-R-L-R-L-R-L-R-L. The groove petered out after a few more minutes and nothing really started up again after that. But it reinforced my idea about just letting the kids do their thing.

The Free School movement has this concept of “deschooling”. I'm sure I won't do it justice, but it's the idea that kids can get really messed up and shut-down from conventional schooling. That some [all?] kids might need some de-schooling before they can get down to the business of freeschooling, reschooling, unschooling, etc. Deschooling can consist of doing nothing, experimenting with all kinds of activities, playing games, reading off in a corner, etc., etc.

If my dad is right, that being rhythmic is being drummed out of our kids by our modern world and our modern school system. Maybe they need some de-rhythming before we can get down to the funky, groovy stuff. I'm thinking that the free school might be the ideal place for this particular experiment, since the kids and the grownups are open to the concept of curriculum-free “lessons” and noodling around. It might take more patience and time than I can give. It might take an awfully long time for the kids to experiment with all the sounds they can figure out on their own before they come to me for a samba part, but my hypothesis is that given enough freedom, it would happen eventually.

I'd love to hear what folks who visit this site think of this. Leave a comment on this thread or email me directly. (carl at snarlnet dot com)

Thanks,

Carl, Your report reminds me of a LOT of lessons that I have had to learn and relearn over and over again as the decades pass and I've gotten to 67 years on the planet.
1) you can't coerce pleasure
2) you can't teach people who don't want, desire, crave the skills you are trying to pass along
3) if you want to keep people in a room drumming happily and pleasurably together and gradually increasing their motivation (desire, craving) for the next visit, you really have to turn it over to them (in your own head, at least, or publicly say "you are in charge"), asking continually: "given who is here in the room, what are we capable of doing that will give most of us the most satisfaction, pleasure, joy?" hence, "the most motivation to continue, come to the next session?"
I taught that first session the way I did because I was conscious of having just one session. Better try to get across as much I could as quickly as I could.
Your basic thinking about how to proceed in a way that was consistent with the school's philosophy, goals, existing processes seems exactly right to me. AND I understand why you chicken'd out and went for structure and instruction, "the sage on the stage" -- like me, you wanted to transmit the traditional skills that you know have worked for decades & decades to keep Puerto Ricans happy, or to keep Africans moving and grooving in their innovative traditions, or to keep Native Americans coming to the powwow -- hey, the sooner the parents and kids have the beats that keep the "second line" moving down the streets with the band in New Orleans the better!!! BUT . . . . I agree with you and Ivan Illich, the "schooling/deschooling" issues are crucial.
I hope you'll make a commitment to go to the school at a regular time or times each week for a half hour of "facilitating" grooves, "guide on the side" style. Stretch it to a longer period if the demand is there and growing.

"What have you got?" strategy. You ask what people want to do. When they say "reggae tone" or "funk" or whatever, you try and do it, or you ask them to "say it" or "sing it" so you can play it, or ask them to "beatbox it" -- do what they hear with mouth sounds, so you can pull out a part or two and hold the beat(s).

Drum Circle strategy: Two people hold a slower "throb drum" foundation beat on lowest drums, one or two people double time that with maybe a little syncopation in it. Someone who knows how to drum a little can improv or call and respond into this drum circle foundation, other people "relate", add parts as they feel like it. Basically when you put that "possible" common denominator 6/8 handoverhand into the midst of a cacophonous jam, you were trying to turn it into a drum circle with a reference point, a foundation pulse or throb.

Grooving Village strategy: The single most important thing might be the commitment of at least one, preferably two, other drummers/groovers to help keep a good groove going. A commitment from a dancer to come and respond to that groove, would be amazingly good for motivation, morale, pleasure, continuity. Kids who lose interest in drumming can dance; kids bored with dancing can help the drummers; it's like there are two reasons to stay with the grooving village rather than just one reason. The free-school safety valve is like a quality control check point: if kids are over-challenged they may leave, if kids are under-challenged they may leave, if the 2 or 3 drummers can't get a magnetic groove going kids may leave, if the dancer isn't moving like kids would like to move they may leave. You're sitting alone with a drum after 10 minutes, at least you know you have failed! And can figure out what you need to try next time.
One Skill per session strategy: If parents and kids know that "the review" takes only 3 minutes at the beginning of the session, never more!! and that the teaching time is the next 4 minutes of the session, those who want to review old skills and pick up a new one get there on time, those who just want the jam and/or drumcircle/danceparty, come 10 minutes late when some groove is in process.

Give out CDs of the 10 two-minute lessons so people can practice at home.

With the littlest kids always look for the simplest part to hold with someone else, always look for a "large motor" big arm movement way to do a beat or shake so that everyone can see that they really "have" it.

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