I love teaching ESL!

I was able to take my ESL students to the Hunter Museum for a temporary Rock & Roll exhibit. It was big, blown up pictures of musicians/bands from Elvis, to The Doors, to Lauryn Hill, etc. I expected that they'd like the music and find it cool to see pictures of these artists...it didn't go quite like that. I have students mostly from Asia and the Middle East. I learned that there is a big disconnect between the music for them and the culture or "feeling" behind it. 

While they may like songs from Elvis, the Beatles, and Jay Z, they had no cultural connection to the fashion, attitude, and history behind the music. Many of them just couldn't understand or get past Bowie wearing make-up or Janis Joplin's wild "costume".