National Anthem Lesson

On Monday I had the opportunity to conduct a lesson on national anthems. Upon doing my research on this topic I realized that 2 out of the 3 national anthems I chose (Mexico, America and Canada) have nothing to do with the people of that country (presently). Mexico and Americas national anthem is pretty much completely about going to war or fighting a war and in my honest opinion, that has really nothing to do with being a citizen of either of those countries (yes, I understand it's part of their history but both Mexico and America have contributed allot more to the human race then just fighting a war(s)). Canada's National Anthem was the only one that was actually about being a Canadian present, future and past.

So my lesson, do the 3 national anthems have anything to do with the people of that nation? And lets make our own national anthem!

I started out my lesson as usual, with lots of energy. I played students each national anthem and gave a brief history on only the American national anthem. I realized as the clock counted down I was only going to have time to splurge some history on one (Which is unfortunate because I planned to give some history all 3). After each national anthem I asked students if they felt that the anthem represented the people of that nation. They agreed with me that the American and Mexican National Anthems don't have much to do with the current citizens of both the U.S and Mexico. As the lesson went on I couldn't help but feel that students were growing concerned, "how dare he question our national anthem!" but alas, this country was built on people being defiant.

My main goal of this lesson was to leave students wondering "why do we sing about something that really doesn't have anything to do with our present life and call it our national anthem." I believe I achived this.

I also kept the class engaged with lots of questions and lots of movement.

In the future I will be sure to let students know that we are going to be analyzing the meaning of the national anthems instead of just saying "We are going to be learning about these 3 national anthems."

This way students will have a clear understanding from the get go as to where im going with my lesson.

On another note, I do believe I got the students thinking and engaged, I also believe that I more or less got my point across, especially since I've had a few people come up to me after my lesson and speak to me about the point that I was trying to make.

For future lessons, I need to learn how to time manage better and develop a quicker way of getting my information across with out losing any substance.