Moscow — Strumming and singing across southern Russia, a group of four American teachers has introduced traditional American folk music to thousands of Russian children.
“Traditional American folk music embodies an aspect of American culture which young Russians aren’t normally exposed to,” said Matthew Nelson of Oklahoma, one of the founders of the group that calls its project “Ramblin’ Across Russia: Accessing Language and Culture Through American Folk Music.”
“So much of what these kids know about our country comes from Hollywood films and MTV, and what we wanted to do was offer them a different perspective,” Nelson said.
Nelson spent the last year as a Fulbright Program English teaching assistant (ETA) at a university in the Russian far east city of Vladivostok. He traveled with the group in June 2010 to five cities — Elista, Rostov-on-Don, Gubkin, Ufa and Samara — where the U.S. State Department funds English-language camps for secondary school students through its English Access Microscholarship Program.
Elista is the capital of the Buddhist republic of Kalmykia and is famous for its temples, throat-singing and affinity for chess. Gubkin is a small mining city near the Ukrainian border. Ufa is the capital of the Republic of Bashkortostan, with large populations of Turkic-speaking Bashkirs and Tatars. Samara is a city of immense historical importance on the bank of the Volga River, where most Soviet government bodies were located during World War II.
MUSIC AS A TEACHER
Nelson, along with Brendan Mulvihill of Philadelphia, another Fulbright teaching assistant working in Tomsk in Siberia, came up with the idea for the group during the English teaching assistants’ program orientation in Moscow last fall.
“We were hanging out with a group of ETAs in Moscow. I had brought along my banjo and we were just playing songs and talking about our expectations for the upcoming year of teaching in Russia when the idea hit us,” Nelson said. “We realized that our interests, abilities and experience could be used to do something out of the ordinary, something that would truly fulfill the Fulbright organization’s mission of cultural exchange.”
Nelson and Mulvihill drafted lesson plans and content for the project, but knew they needed help. Mulvihill got in touch with Gillian Grassie, who was traveling through India and China with her harp, studying emerging music on a Thomas J. Watson Fellowship. Nelson contacted Jordan Stern, a classmate from Lewis and Clark University in Portland, Oregon, who not only plays guitar and banjo, but also has experience working with youth in after-school programs and as a counselor at a drug rehabilitation center in San Francisco.
The Ramblers perform for an enthusiastic audience in Gubkin.
The Ramblers perform for an enthusiastic audience in Gubkin.
After months of planning and preparations, the group, calling themselves The Ramblers, assembled in Tomsk at the end of May to begin their journey.
The project was sponsored by the U.S. State Department’s Fulbright organization and the English Language Office of the U.S. Embassy in Moscow. The goal was to create a fun and relaxed atmosphere where students could study English while experiencing a different part of American culture. The project, the group says, is the first of its kind and is unique in its marriage of English as a Second Language (ESL) techniques used in
American schools with cultural exposure through music.
Their lessons and musical repertoire focused on traditional American folk music dating back to the first immigrants from Europe. “Through their lessons students learned about the diversity of cultures and musical traditions which came together to create American folk music; they learned about historically important events such as the Great Depression and the civil rights movement; and they learned about the lives of folk musicians, farmers, coal miners and train-hopping hobos,” Nelson said.
The students also had a unique opportunity to interact with native English speakers in an informal setting. Many of these camps are located in remote areas of Russia that rarely receive visitors from the United States. For many of the students, The Ramblers are the first Americans they’ve encountered in person.
“Interacting with the students is by far the best part of our tour,” Stern said. “Just chatting with the kids, playing games and acting silly — this is what it’s really all about. The kids really open up to us and the typical teacher-student relationship disappears, which I think makes it much more interesting and fun for everyone involved.”
The Ramblers worked with local teachers, both within the five camps and in the larger communities. Teachers observed and assisted the group during their lessons to see how they incorporated music and cultural content into the study of English. With a grant from the State Department’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, the group also received help from more than 60 Russian alumni of various U.S. programs. The alumni will be involved in the compilation and promotion of a study package developed as a result of the project.
The Ramblers gave presentations to local teachers about American folk music and its use in teaching English, as well as other topics such as the role of Web 2.0 and other Internet resources in ESL education.
“For us, it’s about discovering small and unique pockets of Russian culture and seeing vast amounts of the gorgeous countryside through train windows,” Mulvihill said. “It’s so easy to visit the big, famous cities, so being able to see a different side of Russia has been a pleasure.”
