Rhyme and Reason: Teaching With a Hip-Hop Beat

WASHINGTON, Aug. 1, 2006 — -- Imagine Eminem, Jay-Z or Busta Rhymes tutoring students for the all-important SAT exam. The sessions would be intense, full of energy and speaker-rattling rhythm. But would it help your child perform better on the test?

It sounds rather nontraditional, but that is exactly the approach that two young men who love hip-hop have taken to educate a growing number of students across the country.

After meeting in California, Alex Rappaport, a graduate of Tufts University, and Blake Harrison, a University of Pennsylvania graduate -- combined their love of hip-hop with their desire to educate a struggling segment of the student population. They call their groundbreaking method Flocabulary, and since 2004 have worked to bridge the gap between academic culture and hip-hop culture.

"How can I memorize every single word of my favorite rap album, but I struggle to memorize simple lessons in class?" said 25-year-old Harrison as he thought back to how he wrestled with certain subjects during his high school days. "So I brought hip-hop and my studies together, and the union helped me tremendously."

Harrison is also known as Emcee Escher. He does the rapping for Flocabulary. Rappaport, 26, is the duo's producer.

The pair produces hip-hop music to foster literacy and promote academics with CDs, a Web site and a live workshop called Shakespeare's Hip-Hop School Tour.

The workshops combine a live performance, demonstrations and audience participation to show students the importance of bringing passion to the classroom. By using the rhyming patterns of hip-hop, the Flocabulary concept improves students' memorization skills, the duo said.

To get their point across, Harrison and Rappaport use lines like "Columbus sailed the ocean blue in 1492." But the sessions often get much more creative.

"We tell the students 'Don't be afraid because it's Shakespeare,'" Rappaport said. "And it's really the same idea as 500 years ago. What Shakespeare and other poets did was take their love of the spoken word and use it as a way to teach."