The Most Popular Door

When I returned to school after Winter Break, I was greeted by a few sixth grade students, loitering around my classroom door before the first bell even rang.

What on Earth could cause sixth graders to want to get to school early and rush to the music room the day after a long vacation?

Why, Mary Poppins. That's what. Now spit spot!

The fifth and sixth graders perform in a spring musical every year at my school. It has become a tradition. And those sixth graders hanging around my door were looking for the cast list.

"It's not up yet," I told them stoically.

"Oh . . ."

"Go to patrol," I said without giving anything away.

They left in a daze, and I posted the list.

I think I get just as excited about the play. Last year, I dressed up as Mary Poppins when it was Dress-As-Your-Favorite-Book-Character Day.

I used to put on musicals and plays with my little brother. I dressed him up like Wee Willy Winkie and Raggedy Andy. Now, I just have a bigger group of kids to boss around.

Speaking of a bigger group, 120 kids auditioned this year, 67% of the students in our upper grades.

I try to make the audition process difficult in hopes of weeding out some of the less motivated kids. In order to be considered, they have to get a contract signed by their teacher saying they are getting their work done and behaving in class. They also have to do a singing audition if they want to audition for a speaking part. It is musical theater, after all.

Even with those stipulations, 120 kids tried out.

I couldn't have planned it better with the Mary Poppins sequel in theaters over Christmas. The truth is though, I had it scheduled before I knew that was a thing.

The bottom picture is a Christmas gift from brother and sister-in-law. Even my family gets in on the action.

A few years ago, some of the kids would get discouraged about not getting the main roles and would act out in unhealthy ways, but we have worked hard at our school at reiterating the importance of all parts in a theater production. The students have learned to be gracious regarding the casting and dealing with their disappointment.

"I was so nervous over break!" a sixth grader said. "I couldn't wait to get back to school!"

(I was nervous too. Casting 120 kids is no small feat.)

"I just wanted to be in it!" one fifth grader told me. "It looked like so much fun last year!"

So that's how my door becomes the most popular door after break. The kids camp out outside my classroom that first week, studying the cast list. And, let's be honest, a few of the teachers come by too. 

Then I post the lunch rehearsal schedules, and the kids hang around and study those. Sometimes, they get sad when they don’t get called in for rehearsal.

Of course, they are still fifth and sixth graders. Occasionally, I still have to “pull teeth” to get them to sing. But I just offer candy to the group who sings the best, and they usually do okay.

A couple of years ago, I read an article featuring, Lin Manuel Miranda, coincidentally one of the stars of Mary Poppins Returns.

In the article, he talked about his elementary music teacher and how she directed the students in a play at the end of their sixth grade year:

"The entire sixth grade culminates in doing a musical and the whole elementary comes to see the sixth graders perform. I saw Westside Story when I was in kindergarten. In first grade, I saw Fiddler on the Roof. In second, I saw a mash-up of the Wizard of Oz and The Wiz. By second grade, you’re already thinking, ‘What’s our play going to be when we’re the sixth graders?’"

I read this and thought, “I do that! These are my students!”

Here is the conclusion Miranda came to about this early musical experience, “The impact of arts education on my career is complete, total, and it saved my life."

And there it was. Purpose.

 

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