A short note
Broadly speaking, rapping is an artistic form of vocal delivery that incorporates rhyme and rhythmic speech. It is often performed over a backing beat or musical accompaniment. A rap song has a content (lyrics), flow (rhythm/beat and rhyme), and rendering (spoken word art, sing-song speech with cadence and tone). When used for academic content delivery, 16-bars is the amount of time that a student or a teacher is generally given to perform a verse. Here one bar is equal to four beats of music. However, adaptations and improvisations are allowed by the teacher or students attempting non-rap use rap for cognitive and non-cognitive gains. Even attempting rap-like verses is great mental effort for mindful engagement with the subject matter
Features of rap verses and songs
Most academic raps songs are built out of 8, 12, 16 or 32 bar verses; Four beats or syllables make one bar. 8 and 12 bar verse are considered good for kids
Academic rap lyrics have 2-3 verses with a beat or a structural flexibility
They have a hook which is repetitive and sung as a chorus between verses
They are often on learnt matter during classroom instruction to facilitate recall
They include the terms and concepts of topics as described in a standard text book
They use language arts and rhyming words to provide loud rhythm
They are rendered with hand gestures and body movement
Rendering is loud rhythmic spoken word art, like a sing-song talking Note: Most teachers at senior school level use 'a 16 bar for one verse' of a song by making of academic subject matter
Here is a two verse rap lyric on force as an example
HOOK:
Force is a vector: yes, vector-vector
Magnitude-direction actor
Verse-1
Physical vector quantity force
Push-n-pull, it’s of course, of course
[HOOK]
Verse-2
A force changes or it tends to change
Speed,-shape-direction, when close range
[HOOK]
The inset collage shows some of the common hand gestures rappers use while singing.
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