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Empowering Student voices with the MTV Music Video Awards!

As a music education platform, that is inspired by pop culture, we have seen firsthand the impact of fueling student creativity. By inspiring and encouraging them to dream, then practice, record and reflecting on their experience, they take ownership of their own learning journey. And the result is deeper learning.
Nadine Levitt

Nadine Levitt

2 Min Read

The MTV Video Music Awards (VMA) are coming up and while it’s not traditionally thought of as a “family” event, it does provide a good opportunity to engage students and empower their voices!

Once dubbed the “Super Bowl for Youth”, the awards have honored the biggest stars in music and celebrate the best music videos of the year, as well as honoring the work they do outside of music.

Last year for instance they honored Lady Gaga with a Tricon Award – which recognizes her exceptional talents across three disciplines, as an actress, musician and fashion icon.

As a music education platform, that is inspired by pop culture, we have seen firsthand the impact of fueling student creativity. By inspiring and encouraging them to dream, then practice, record and reflecting on their experience, they take ownership of their own learning journey. And the result is deeper learning.

Here is a fun activity to try at home, or if you are an educator see the full lesson plan on WURRLYedu or use the FlipGrid lesson HERE.

INSPIRE: Lady Gaga won 5 trophies at the 2020 VMA´s, including the first ever Tricon Award (which recognizes her exceptional talents across three disciplines, as an actress, musician and fashion icon). Watch this video of her acceptance speech: 



PRACTICE: Think about what you are passionate about, then select a song (or write your own) that can be used to express the message you are wanting to convey, and plan a music video or acceptance speech inspiring others. Think about how the music, your acting and also your fashion can influence the message.

TIP: WURRLYedu offers thousands of appropriate popular songs and freestyle tracks that can change in key, speed and instrumentation, and many have vocal guides so you can get creative with dance, lip syncing or singing along!



RECORD: Record your music video or acceptance speech inspiring others!



REFLECT: Watch the videos back together and reflect on how that felt – what worked best and what would you change? Start a conversation about what influenced the message of the song? Did anything surprise you?



Author(s)

  • Nadine Levitt

    Founder & CEO

    WURRLYedu & My Mama Says

    Nadine is a Swiss-born German, Kiwi, US transplant, and founder of the music technology company, Wurrly, LLC. She began her career as a lawyer but after 6 years of practice, she began to pursue a career in music as a professional opera singer and songwriter. She has performed extensively all over the United States and the world, sharing the stage with David Foster, Andrea Boccelli, Kiri Te Kanawa, Roger Daltry, Christina Perri, and Steven Tyler to name a few. Passionate about music in schools she sits on the national board of Little Kids Rock, and in 2016 led the development of the music education platform WURRLYedu, which empowers student voices and makes it easy to bring a fun and effective music education to schools. Nadine is also an author of children's books, including the My Mama Says book series, which teaches kids to identify, acknowledge and direct their emotions.