Unschooling Wisdom From the Education Majors Who Are "Wiggles"
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Thought y'all would enjoy this excerpt about the little kids'
sensation The Wiggles:
(from a Washington Post interview)
The group was formed by three friends who met in an early childhood education
program at a university in Sydney. They wanted to be teachers, and for a
while two of them were. But they also played music -- a pair were in a band called
the Cockroaches -- and what they learned in college about the 3-year-old
brain they began to apply to their songwriting.
"It's not just that they know less, they think quite differently," says
Murray Cook, who chatted for a couple minutes in MCI Center's press room before
the show on Monday. "You really have to focus on them more, because they're
really egocentric. The world revolves around them, so a lot of the stuff we do is
to empower them. A lot of it is interactive, songs that have things for them
to do."
Cook, who is well over 6 feet 4 inches takes the Wiggles seriously without
seeming humorless or deadly earnest. He and his band mates -- yes, they play
instruments -- can do corny without irony, and they all appear genuinely amused
by the antics of their audience, which is why their act never seems at all
creepy. Cook, for one, enjoys being a celebrity to people who think he lives in
the television, or don't understand what perspiration is.
"When I go out into the audience, usually the kids just say things like 'Why
are you wet?' Once a kid said to me, 'You're melting!' "
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
sensation The Wiggles:
(from a Washington Post interview)
The group was formed by three friends who met in an early childhood education
program at a university in Sydney. They wanted to be teachers, and for a
while two of them were. But they also played music -- a pair were in a band called
the Cockroaches -- and what they learned in college about the 3-year-old
brain they began to apply to their songwriting.
"It's not just that they know less, they think quite differently," says
Murray Cook, who chatted for a couple minutes in MCI Center's press room before
the show on Monday. "You really have to focus on them more, because they're
really egocentric. The world revolves around them, so a lot of the stuff we do is
to empower them. A lot of it is interactive, songs that have things for them
to do."
Cook, who is well over 6 feet 4 inches takes the Wiggles seriously without
seeming humorless or deadly earnest. He and his band mates -- yes, they play
instruments -- can do corny without irony, and they all appear genuinely amused
by the antics of their audience, which is why their act never seems at all
creepy. Cook, for one, enjoys being a celebrity to people who think he lives in
the television, or don't understand what perspiration is.
"When I go out into the audience, usually the kids just say things like 'Why
are you wet?' Once a kid said to me, 'You're melting!' "
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]