SERVICE LEARNING DAY #3:

Today we kept with our plan and had only one visit because we were so far ahead of schedule after our last service learning day. We made an appointment for 11:00 with a couple named Steve and Carol Frogue. They were excited to hear us and waited for us at their door. We sat with them in their living room and talked with them for around a half an hour about the concept of our project and they loved what we were doing! We then sang them "Build Me Up Buttercup" after which we talked some more about their school dances and what songs they remembered. Then we sang "Brown-Eyed Girl" which brought a lot of memories to their minds about relationships. They told us the story of how they met and  (with much hesitation) about Steve's previous girlfriends. We had a lot of fun with them and they wished us luck! 

SERVICE LEARNING PREP #3: 
Today, our plan is to make an appointment with one more participant. We would also like to learn one of the song suggestions we received from our last participant. We are excited for tomorrow! We plan to do only one visit tomorrow and spend the rest of the time editing the footage we have taken so far. 

Today was a bit of a surprise. We had an appointment for 1:00 so we learned two new songs for our visit: Ain't No Mountain High Enough and Build Me Up Buttercup. We spent the morning learning the songs and writing on our blog. We finished early and ended up leaving school earlier than anticipated. Instead of going straight to Bobby Johnson's house, we drove to my church (Geneva Presbyterian) to see if anyone in the office wanted to give us a story. The moment we walked through the door we realized we were in the right place. There were four ladies there who were more than enthusiastic to share their stories. We played our songs to them all at once to smiling applause then recorded stories from each of them in turn.
We then drove to Bobby Johnson's house (and got lost on the way). She was waiting with her door open and welcomed us in smiling. She moved us from her office to her beautiful living room and we played our songs to her. She sang along to both of them and listened with her eyes closed. She then shared her stories with us and practically summarized the purpose of our whole project. Her stories were inspiring and interesting and she enjoyed our visit immensely. She gave us three songs that she thought other people from her age group would enjoy most (Racing With the Moon, Stardust, Buttermilk Sky). Overall, it was a very productive day!

SERVICE LEARNING DAY 2 (7 November 2012):
Today the plan is to learn songs we looked at yesterday and then visit one more participant at 1:00 pm. This morning, along with learning songs, we will be calling more potential participants and finalizing a list for each service learning day. We are looking to have a participant for the morning of each service learning day and one for the afternoon. If we are not able to find a willing participant for this morning, we will visit one on Saturday next week. We are confident that today will be productive and enjoyable.

Service Learning Prep #2

Currently, our setlist consists of two songs: Brown Eyed Girl by Van Morrison and Twist and Shout by The Beatles. Our last participant was very receptive of the songs that we had performed, so we wish to increase and expand our setlist by adding at least two more songs, in hopes of provoking even more stories that we will be able to record and document.

Two New songs we were thinking of adding are:

Build Me Up Buttercup by The Temptations

Ain't No Mountain High Enough - Marvin Gaye & Tammi Terrell

Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds - Diamonds

Peggy Sue - Buddy Holly

SERVICE LEARNING DAY 1 (24 October 2012):

Today was the first day we visited a participant. Her name was Elizabeth and is very close to Rachel, kind of a second grandmother. We performed both songs for her, Brown Eyed Girl by Van Morrison and Twist and Shout by The Beatles. When we finished performing for her, she remembered a time when she was studying in college, when there were dance parties every weekend and everyone was good at dancing. She told us a story about a small, muscular man named Ray who had been her dancing parter for some time. She told us how in the middle of dancing, he had picked her up, thew her over his right him, brought her up, threw her over his left hip, brought her up, and then threw her between his legs and brought her up one final time. 

Overall, this day was a great success and was not hard to accomplish. We look forward to the upcoming service learning days, and the further recordings stories. 

         When we were planning during our last Service Learning preparation day, we created our project. Our plan is to give the elderly a chance to interact and be entertained by the younger generation as well as the opportunity to relive the best times of their lives: their teenage years. Because the residents of Laguna Woods Village live in a community of people 55 years or older, they rarely interact with people outside their retirement community. We will learn and perform songs from the 40’s 50’s and 60’s, perform two of them on each service learning day, film the participants telling a specific story from their teenage years that our songs bring to mind, create a collage of their stories and their faces when they listen to our performance, and send the finished collage to each of the participants we interview, thus giving them a chance to relive their teenage years through the eyes of others who lived in the same era. 




         Once we created our plan, we began to learn songs to sing. We now know "Twist and Shout" and "Brown Eyed Girl."

         Since our plan was presented to our panel, Rachel has announced our project to a few potential participants and they have excitedly agreed to participate in out project. Today we plan to visit a spunky friend and long-time foster grandmother of Rachel in order to hear her many stories. Wish us luck!