“Time for a sample moment,” the teacher announces to his students. The polyrhythmic break and driving guitar solo that open the Isley Brothers’ “That Lady” fills the room. Marc “Scramblelock” Sakalauskas, the teacher of “One Nation Under a Groove” at Place Cartier High School in Montreal, dances a little and asks: “What popular artist has recently sampled this track?”
The students who are paying attention shrug. Others peer into their cell phones or continue napping. But when Mr. Sakalauskas hits play on Kendrick Lamar’s “I,” all eyes are on him. “That’s what’s up!” he shouts, and a lively discussion begins.
The discussion takes the form of a cypher. Also spelled “cipher,” this is the space in hip hop culture where artists freestyle – a literal circle of participants who’ve gathered to showcase their skills, exercise their creativity and develop their talents. Figuratively, the cypher represents community. In this classroom, it is an environment where students share ideas.
The spirit of the cypher is at the heart of Sakalauskas’ program. His cultural studies course is one of many where hip hop education, supported by multidisciplinary, project-based learning, fosters the creative, cognitive and social development of young people.
Hip hop education is no longer a new concept, especially in the United States. Many practitioners have developed a variety of ways to integrate hip hop into education. Even artists such as GZA, KRS-One and Common are actively supporting the movement by working with educators to develop curricula.
And this teaching method is spreading north of the border. In Montreal, there is Writing Our Rhymes Down (WORD), a youth-led program in high schools that uses hip hop music and culture to cultivate literacy skills and critical thinking. The program provides each participant with the resources to write, record and produce their own original hip hop track.
While some programs offer lessons where students analyze rap lyrics, WORD has its participants write their own rhymes. The success of these verse-writing workshops lies in rap’s ability to compound a large amount of words into one track. At about 250 words per sixteen bars – the typical length of a rap verse – vocabulary is essential. According to Lou Piensa, an educator and hip hop artist who works with WORD, participants quickly learn “that the most impressive rap lyricists are the ones who manage to be creative and original and have an extensive vocabulary.”
With this in mind, WORD’s participants work within technical challenges like never repeating the same word twice, which leads them to a rhyme dictionary or thesaurus. They’re also encouraged to develop multisyllabic rhymes, not just an end rhyme, and they have to avoid swear words unless they are truly justified in expressing a particular feeling. Finally, students are taught how to use literary devices in their work. As a result, they are not only considering the poetic aspect of rap but also actively writing poetry, and with that comes a sense of accomplishment.
As these young lyricists see their verses come together, Piensa explains, “their peers react positively to it, their confidence builds up, and their personality starts to shine. We’ve had countless reports from teachers saying that shy students who took part in our workshops started to speak up in class discussions or write essays with deeper reflections.”
WORD adds a dimension of social awareness to this personal growth by drawing attention to the predominant violence in some rap. Its participants discuss the social settings that might push rappers to write negative or violent lyrics. The workshops also highlight current rap artists who voice the positive aspects of hip hop culture. “Once participants see that there is more to it than just simple rhymes about sex, money and violence,” Piensa explains, “they often find a place that better resembles them.”
In his “sample moment” lesson, Marc “Scramblelock” Sakalauskas invites his students to consider how hip hop artists create their music and to become more than just passive consumers of pop culture. When some students say they don’t like Kendrick Lamar’s “I” as much as his more current-sounding tracks, Sakalauskas admits that “I” has a throwback sound. He then explains that the song can be seen in part as an homage to the roots of hip hop and the influence of funk on rap beats. This lesson, Sakalauskas explains, “opens up a critical dialogue where we’re reflecting on the art form in its past and present mutations.”
At the end of each session, Sakalauskas’ class puts on a hip hop jam that incorporates all the elements of hip hop – djing, rap, dance and graffiti. Students are responsible for planning the event and receive marks for their participation. Sakalauskas is often impressed by previously unengaged students who’ve taken on important roles in coordinating the event. In this context, the students collaborate, solve problems and build a sense of community within their school.
The importance both Sakalauskas and Piensa place on their student’s opinions points to the very ethos of hip hop education, where young people are valued as thinkers and creators. “Oftentimes young people are not encouraged to express themselves, and this can have terrible consequences,” Piensa says. “Rap has an interesting characteristic: it is very participatory and emphasizes the importance of telling one’s story.”
Stephen “Buddha” Leafloor uses this storytelling aspect of hip hop to perform social work. His five-day program “Blueprint For Life” is aimed at Native Canadian youth and encourages its participants to tell their own stories and to incorporate cultural symbols into their dancing, with the goal of healing deep wounds and strengthening community ties.
While storytelling as talk therapy has its benefits, Leafloor reflects on how the visceral experience of hip hop, especially dance, can bring more immediate results. “Someone full of rage from being sexually abused could be drawn to b-boying/b-girling because it manages their rage in real time through extreme physicality and creativity,” he explains. “The elements of hip hop have an immediate feedback loop.”
Leafloor calls on the African-American proverb “each one teach one” to characterize how Blueprint participants develop leadership skills. This proverb describes a process of learning and mentorship, where one student imparts his or her knowledge onto another. This process has the potential to turn into a cycle of healing and growth. When one person overcomes personal struggles and mentors another in the spirit of “each one teach one,” Leafloor notes that “it makes something positive out of something negative, and it deepens the process of one’s ongoing healing.”
Hip hop’s origin story illustrates this healing modality. At the start of each year, WORD gives a brief history lesson, describing the socio-economic situation in the Bronx in the 1970s – the birthplace of hip hop – where poverty, crime and drugs were ubiquitous. With this backdrop, Piensa highlights the ingenuity of hip hop in the face of adversity, and therein lies the most important lesson: “Hip hop is one of the most influential and most international cultural movements of the century, and it came from young people who were thought to be doomed for failure.”
Armed with this message and a solid curriculum, Piensa, Sakalauskas, Leafloor and other hip hop educators strive to make their students recognize their own potential and to build their confidence and skills to meet it. Moreover, they aim to create a figurative cypher, a learning environment where students are encouraged to take risks, to be creative and curious, and to use their experiential knowledge to navigate the complex society we live in today.
More on the cypher and hip hop education:
The Cipher, the Circle & its Wisdom
Hip Hop Genius – Remixing High School Education
The Hip Hop Education Guidebook
"Time for a sample moment,” the teacher announces to his students. The polyrhythmic break and driving guitar solo that open the Isley Brothers’ “That Lady” fills the room. Marc “Scramblelock” Sakalauskas, the teacher of “One Nation Under a Groove” at Place Cartier High School in Montreal, dances a little and asks: “What popular artist has recently sampled this track?”
The students who are paying attention shrug. Others peer into their cell phones or continue napping. But when Mr. Sakalauskas hits play on Kendrick Lamar’s “I,” all eyes are on him. “That’s what’s up!” he shouts, and a lively discussion begins.
The discussion takes the form of a cypher. Also spelled “cipher,” this is the space in hip hop culture where artists freestyle - a literal circle of participants who’ve gathered to showcase their skills, exercise their creativity and develop their talents. Figuratively, the cypher represents community. In this classroom, it is an environment where students share ideas.
The spirit of the cypher is at the heart of Sakalauskas’ program. His cultural studies course is one of many where hip hop education, supported by multidisciplinary, project-based learning, fosters the creative, cognitive and social development of young people.
- Photo: Stock
Rap has an interesting characteristic: it is very participatory and emphasizes the importance of telling one's story.Hip hop education is no longer a new concept, especially in the United States. Many practitioners have developed a variety of ways to integrate hip hop into education. Even artists such as GZA, KRS-One and Common are actively supporting the movement by working with educators to develop curricula.
And this teaching method is spreading north of the border. In Montreal, there is Writing Our Rhymes Down (WORD), a youth-led program in high schools that uses hip hop music and culture to cultivate literacy skills and critical thinking. The program provides each participant with the resources to write, record and produce their own original hip hop track.
While some programs offer lessons where students analyze rap lyrics, WORD has its participants write their own rhymes. The success of these verse-writing workshops lies in rap’s ability to compound a large amount of words into one track. At about 250 words per sixteen bars - the typical length of a rap verse - vocabulary is essential. According to Lou Piensa, an educator and hip hop artist who works with WORD, participants quickly learn “that the most impressive rap lyricists are the ones who manage to be creative and original and have an extensive vocabulary.”
With this in mind, WORD’s participants work within technical challenges like never repeating the same word twice, which leads them to a rhyme dictionary or thesaurus. They’re also encouraged to develop multisyllabic rhymes, not just an end rhyme, and they have to avoid swear words unless they are truly justified in expressing a particular feeling. Finally, students are taught how to use literary devices in their work. As a result, they are not only considering the poetic aspect of rap but also actively writing poetry, and with that comes a sense of accomplishment.
As these young lyricists see their verses come together, Piensa explains, “their peers react positively to it, their confidence builds up, and their personality starts to shine. We've had countless reports from teachers saying that shy students who took part in our workshops started to speak up in class discussions or write essays with deeper reflections.”
WORD adds a dimension of social awareness to this personal growth by drawing attention to the predominant violence in some rap. Its participants discuss the social settings that might push rappers to write negative or violent lyrics. The workshops also highlight current rap artists who voice the positive aspects of hip hop culture. “Once participants see that there is more to it than just simple rhymes about sex, money and violence,” Piensa explains, “they often find a place that better resembles them.”
In his “sample moment” lesson, Marc “Scramblelock” Sakalauskas invites his students to consider how hip hop artists create their music and to become more than just passive consumers of pop culture. When some students say they don’t like Kendrick Lamar’s “I” as much as his more current-sounding tracks, Sakalauskas admits that “I” has a throwback sound. He then explains that the song can be seen in part as an homage to the roots of hip hop and the influence of funk on rap beats. This lesson, Sakalauskas explains, “opens up a critical dialogue where we’re reflecting on the art form in its past and present mutations.”
At the end of each session, Sakalauskas’ class puts on a hip hop jam that incorporates all the elements of hip hop - djing, rap, dance and graffiti. Students are responsible for planning the event and receive marks for their participation. Sakalauskas is often impressed by previously unengaged students who’ve taken on important roles in coordinating the event. In this context, the students collaborate, solve problems and build a sense of community within their school.
The importance both Sakalauskas and Piensa place on their student’s opinions points to the very ethos of hip hop education, where young people are valued as thinkers and creators. “Oftentimes young people are not encouraged to express themselves, and this can have terrible consequences,” Piensa says. “Rap has an interesting characteristic: it is very participatory and emphasizes the importance of telling one's story.”
Stephen “Buddha” Leafloor uses this storytelling aspect of hip hop to perform social work. His five-day program “Blueprint For Life” is aimed at Native Canadian youth and encourages its participants to tell their own stories and to incorporate cultural symbols into their dancing, with the goal of healing deep wounds and strengthening community ties.
While storytelling as talk therapy has its benefits, Leafloor reflects on how the visceral experience of hip hop, especially dance, can bring more immediate results. “Someone full of rage from being sexually abused could be drawn to b-boying/b-girling because it manages their rage in real time through extreme physicality and creativity,” he explains. “The elements of hip hop have an immediate feedback loop.”
Leafloor calls on the African-American proverb “each one teach one” to characterize how Blueprint participants develop leadership skills. This proverb describes a process of learning and mentorship, where one student imparts his or her knowledge onto another. This process has the potential to turn into a cycle of healing and growth. When one person overcomes personal struggles and mentors another in the spirit of “each one teach one,” Leafloor notes that “it makes something positive out of something negative, and it deepens the process of one’s ongoing healing.”
Hip hop’s origin story illustrates this healing modality. At the start of each year, WORD gives a brief history lesson, describing the socio-economic situation in the Bronx in the 1970s - the birthplace of hip hop - where poverty, crime and drugs were ubiquitous. With this backdrop, Piensa highlights the ingenuity of hip hop in the face of adversity, and therein lies the most important lesson: “Hip hop is one of the most influential and most international cultural movements of the century, and it came from young people who were thought to be doomed for failure.”
Armed with this message and a solid curriculum, Piensa, Sakalauskas, Leafloor and other hip hop educators strive to make their students recognize their own potential and to build their confidence and skills to meet it. Moreover, they aim to create a figurative cypher, a learning environment where students are encouraged to take risks, to be creative and curious, and to use their experiential knowledge to navigate the complex society we live in today.
More on the cypher and hip hop education:
The Cipher, the Circle & its Wisdom
Hip Hop Genius – Remixing High School Education
The Hip Hop Education Guidebook