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Math Professor Larry Lesser finds:
MATH + MUSIC = MORE MOTIVATION
Fighting the negativity
towards mathematics still too socially acceptable in popular culture
(reflected by songs such as “Math
Suks” from the 1999 Jimmy Buffet album or by dolls that say
"math class is tough"), Larry Lesser (an
Associate Professor of mathematics at Savannah's Armstrong Atlantic
State University) motivates teachers and students by merging two of
his great loves -- mathematics and music. Recently, he presented
the first songs-in-math-class workshop the annual
teacher institute of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame & Museum has
had, gave the first artists-in-the-classroom workshop at the
International Folk Alliance Conference, and was featured in a story in
Australia's largest-selling newspaper.
Published as a mathematics
educator and songwriter
(as well as textbook
author and music journalist), "Mathemusician" Lesser has
ample qualifications to share links between math,
music and song. While getting his mathematics BA, Lesser
began songwriting and taking music classes (his only straight-A subject
in college!), and helped initiate a for-credit songwriting course at
Rice University. While getting a masters in statistics and PhD in
mathematics education, Lesser was VP of the Austin Songwriters’ Group,
took private music lessons and ACC music business courses, taught adult
education courses in songwriting at the University of Texas, enjoyed
some success with his contemporary
folk songs (including regional awards, gigs and positive media
reviews) and his song “Earthwoman” was recorded on an album by the
acoustic trio Folkus and played on KGSR-FM (Progressive/Triple A format)
and KUT-FM (NPR-affiliate). While Lesser had long appreciated the
mathematical structures and patterns in the songs he was writing, he was
beginning to explore how music might make the mathematics he was
teaching more memorable, accessible and exciting for his students,
especially for those who did not feel positive connections with
mathematics.
After taking his guitar
and trying out his talents in his classrooms, Lesser was encouraged to
take it further, continuing to create, adapt and refine an accessible
collection of demonstrations of connections between mathematical and
musical concepts. A few examples of math
& music connections Lesser explores (as can most teachers)
include: connections between notions of number theory and music
theory, mathematical models of how a chime's or string's pitch varies
with its length, how the sound of two notes relates to the ratio of
their frequencies, how mathematics guides the building and playing
of musical instruments, how patterns generate and illuminate rhythms and
sequences of notes and chords, how transformations of a melody parallel
transformations in mathematics, and other ways mathematics is used
(implicitly or explicitly) by composers. [Note
to educators: Some high school and college teachers have
found useful ideas in recent books such as Garland and Kahn's Math
and Music: Harmonious Connections(Dale Seymour) or Beall's Functional
Melodies: Finding Mathematical Relationships in Music(Key Curriculum
Press) or Leon Harkleroad's Mathematics and Music (to be
published jointly by the MAA and Cambridge U. Press). Useful
background articles include Johnson's in the Nov. 2001 Mathematics
Teacher, Osserman's in MAA
Notes #32,
and Keller & Davidson's on math poems in the May 2001 Mathematics
Teacher. College faculty have taught a variety of
semester-long math-and-music classes, ranging from those with no
mathematical or musical prerequisites (e.g., by Leon Harkleroad when at
Cornell University) to those requiring knowledge of music notation and
calculus (e.g., by Dave
Benson at University of Georgia).]
Not content with making
connections only with existing music, Larry also began writing a
creative and playful repertoire
of well-crafted content-rich math songs
(inspired by the work of songwriters such as Tom Lehrer, who, like
Larry, has published lyrics in both academic and non-academic
publications) -- some stand-alone originals (e.g., "Numbers
Man", "Statistician's BLUEs") and others (e.g.,
"American Pi", "Hotel Infinity", "The
Gambler", "We Will Graph You!") that can be sung to the
tune of public domain songs or recent hit songs à la "Weird
Al" Yankovic. While Lesser has added to the already
massive math song repertoire for elementary school, he has had the
largest impact on the much thinner repertoire for middle school and high
school (a time when attitude and success in math greatly affect future
career and college prospects). While the more conventional demands
of his work as a mathematics educator have kept him too busy to fulfill
requests for a "math song CD", a CD's worth
of his
math lyrics have appeared in international/national publications
(e.g., journals such as Mathematics Teacher, Teaching
Statistics, STATS, and Humanistic Mathematics
Network Journal,and books such as the new M.U.S.I.C.
sourcebook Learning
From Lyrics, alongside
lyrics by the likes of Bruce Springsteen, Peter Gabriel, Neil Young and
Sting), which have generated several republication requests
and offers for a larger book project. Although the high
quality of Lesser's lyrics reflect his substantial proficiencies in both
mathematics education and songwriting (it's not easy rhyming words like parabola!),
he maintains that all have the ability and deserve the opportunity to
write their own songs or at least couplets of verse/rap, and he has
encountered many enjoyable examples written by teachers and by students.
Lesser has written lyrics that can be sung to the tune of songs made
famous by country, pop, folk and rock recording artists such as:
Madonna, the Eagles, Queen, Bette Midler, Bob Dylan, Kenny Rogers, Paul
Simon, Billy Joel, Suzanne Vega, Led Zeppelin and John Lennon.
To strengthen his ideas
(by the process of peer-review) and spread them to the widest audiences,
he wrote pioneering full-length teacher-friendly
interdisciplinary articles (e.g., "Sum of Songs: Making
Mathematics Less Monotone!" in the May 2000 issue of Mathematics
Teacherand "Musical Means: Using Songs in Teaching
Statistics" in the Autumn
2001 issue of Teaching
Statistics) that show how raps and songs can be used to motivate
students in the mathematics classroom, offering (even those with minimal
musicianship) numerous activities, tips, and examples. Following
his mu's (get it?), Lesser's Teaching Statistics article uses
songs for generating descriptive statistics, conducting hypothesis
tests, analyzing lyrics (for specific terms and global themes),
analyzing data, etc., and he published an article of additional original
statistics lyrics in the Winter 2002 STATS. His
Mathematics Teacherarticle offers song-based problem solving,
critical thinking and enrichment activities, and includes several of his
highly original math
lyrics such as "American Pi", which can be sung to the
tune of the song "American Pie" (a #1 hit for Don McLean in
1972 and a Top-30 hit for Madonna in 2000). Teachers can utilize
the new lyric's chorus (see top of the page) as a mnemonic for the first
6 significant figures of pi and may also utilize each line of the verses
for a rich exploration of content and pi's very human history.
Other lyrics illuminate the process of doing mathematics (e.g.,
"Fifty Ways to Work a Problem"; see top of the page) or help
students recall specific procedures (e.g., "We Will Graph
You!"). Published by NCTM,
Mathematics
Teacher is one of the world's most widely read mathematics
education journals (circulation is 50,000 mathematics instructors of
students in grades 8 through college). Lesser's article was
selected as the article from the print issue to appear (from May 2000 -
December 2001) on the journal's website and he was pleasantly startled
that the article generated more response within 2 months than he had
ever received from his previous dozen publications combined! While
thousands of juried articles have been written on math-and-music
connections (e.g., see O'Keeffe's bibliography in the April 1972 Mathematics
Teacher), there appear not to be any besides Lesser's as
specifically and comprehensively on the use of songs in the
mathematics/statistics classroom (please let
him know if you know of some!).
In his classroom
presentations (ranging from a math-song-of-the-month to a full module)
from elementary school to college, Lesser has found many
benefits beyond just plain fun and building community, such as:
motivation, memory
aids, meeting mathematics education standards (especially NCTM
Standard #9,
though Larry's songs address the others, too!), meeting music education
standards (especially MENC
Standard #8), multiple learning styles and intelligences (especially
musical/rhythmic), reducing math phobia, and mashing stereotypes (about
math, math class and maybe even mild-mannered math teachers!).
Lesser hopes his songs spark interest as did Billy Joel’s 1989 hit
“We Didn’t Start the Fire” for many history classrooms.
Lesser explains, "I'm a songwriter at heart who happens to find the
processes and patterns of mathematics fascinating and worthy of songs.
It's a nice alternative to singing about less-evolved pursuits.
While math-and-music is lots of fun, it's also part of a serious
responsibility I feel to connect with all students and help them towards
mathematical literacy and empowerment in our increasingly
information-based society." As his alter ego, The
Mathemusician, Lesser puts his microphone where his mouth is,
resurrecting the musical passion from his student days to perform with a
style that might be described as a mixture of Paul Simon, Weird Al
Yankovic, and Bill Nye the Science Guy (hmmm.... is that as catchy as
"Larry Lesser the Math Professor"?).
Professor Lesser enjoys parallels
between teaching and performing as he also shares his enthusiasm
with colleagues in inservice
workshops and conferences, from local to national, which have
received broad-based
praise and media coverage (such as a feature story in 2002 in
Australia's largest-selling newspaper). Also, Lesser
performed a math song during a recent appearance (it's archived at
www.webct.com; you can skip to the 47th minute to hear the song) on
"Math
Medley," a weekly hour-long talkradio show broadcast live on AM
radio in Arizona and New England and on Internet radio (www.renaissanceradio.com).
This makes Larry one of the very few who has had both
"regular songs" and a "math song" played on radio!
Math-and-music is not the first time his creative teaching has drawn
attention: in 1993, a University of Texas adult education course
he designed and taught on the psychology and probability underlying the
then-new Texas Lottery generated coverage by several Texas newspapers,
the AP wire service and CNN Headline News. Larry's
interdisciplinary teaching aided his being selected to serve as the 2001
Arthur M.
Gignilliat, Jr. Professor at Armstrong Atlantic State
University.
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