by Laura
Herzog, NJ Advance Media for NJ.com
(North
Bergen, NJ--August 05, 2015) A N.J. teacher whose
work garnered a classroom visit from rapper Kendrick Lamar in
June is hosting a workshop promoting his famed method of "hip hop
education."
Titled
"We gon' be alright: The Audacity of Teaching Hip-Hop in Schools,"
the event will take place on Thursday, October 15th, at Spreadhouse
Coffee, 116 Suffolk Street, New York, NY 10002, from 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m.
According to
an event release, the workshop will include "discussion that demonstrates
some of the best practices in hip-hop and spoken word education,"
including warm-up games from Theatre of the Oppressed, mini-lessons, and
close-reading exercises with hip-hop lyrics.
Mooney, who
teaches English at High Tech High School in North Bergen, first gained
attention with a viral blog post that explained how he
uses hip hop--including that of the Grammy winner Lamar--to inspire his
students. Lamar visited Mooney's school on June 8th, in a high-profile
event that was covered by The New York Times.
Mooney
gave his students prompts based on classical literature and
Lamar's music, like "How is the influence of the 'Black Is
Beautiful' cultural movement of the 1960s visible in both Toni Morrison's
novel The Bluest Eye (1970) and Kendrick Lamar's
album To Pimp A Butterfly (2015)?"
More
information on the event, as well as online registration, is available below.
Tickets for the workshop cost $20 and can be purchased at
http://www.thinkolio.org/think/hiphop.
What we will learn:
This Olio will be a workshop and discussion that
demonstrates some of the best practices in hip-hop and spoken word
education. This might involve warm-up games from Theatre of the Oppressed,
mini-lessons, studying of student artifacts, close-reading exercises
with hip-hop lyrics, and creative writing prompts.
Brain Mooney:
I'm an educator, scholar, and poet from New Jersey who
explores the intersections of hip-hop, spoken word, literacy, and urban
education. I hold a bachelor’s degree in English Education from New York
University and am currently studying in a graduate program at Teachers College,
Columbia University.
I am also the founder and curator of Word Up, a high school
poetry slam that champions the voices of youth poets and MCs in Hudson County.
The event has featured guest poets and teaching artists from across the
country, including Kendrick Lamar, Andrea Gibson, Sarah Kay, Jon Sands, Angel Nafis,
Shira Erlichman, Ken Arkind, and Rudy Francisco.
When not grading papers, I enjoy making electronic music, writing poems, and spending time with my wife and our cat, Tigger, who is the coolest.
