This is my sixth and last post from my summer visit to Concordia Language Villages in Minnesota.
So I received Swiss citizenship a few years back, after living in Switzerland more than 12 years. It’s been 17 now, and counting. Way before moving to Switzerland I taught German at these summer immersion programs in Minnesota, at Concordia Language Villages.
I’ve returned for a few days to observe the learning here, and what do you know, I happened to be on site when a special event was organized with the high school students learning German, French, or Italian. They have all come to the French Village to celebrate Swiss National Day. Swiss National Day is actually tomorrow, August 1, but no matter – the date was selected by the Swiss because August 1 is a nice date, not because there was a particular event on that day. Call it Swiss practicality. And I’m happy to celebrate Switzerland any day of the year, it’s a nice place.
The Italian Village (Il Lago del Bosco) sends two song leaders to the stage to teach everyone a song. It’s about a Swiss person in the mountains (where else?) who meets a bird and greets it with a fantastic string of bird sounding syllables that are fun to sing and easy to learn if you are one of the German or French students. It’s the international language of singable syllables. At least, that’s my impression – the crowd is singing with gusto.
Uno Svizzero felice
passeggiando sui monti
quando vede un cuculo
lo saluta così:
O-LI-A … O-LI-I-A-CHI-CHI-A
O-LI-I-A-CHI-CUCU
O-LI-I—I-A-CHI-CHI-A
O-LI-I-A-CHI-CUCU
O-LI-I-A-CHI-CHI-A
O-LI-I-A-CHI-A-O …
A happy Swiss
went through the mountains
when he saw a cuckoo
and greeted it like this:
O-LI-A … O-LI-I-A-CHI-CHI-A …
They finish and turn the stage over to the Germans.
This crowd is easy to teach songs to, since the teaching method is similar no matter the language. The three German counselors, from Waldsee, start with call and response and everyone joins in. Since there are lots of color names in the text, they bring students up to the stage with the matching colored T-shirts as they teach the text: red for the moon, silver for the lake, green for the pine forest. They point to the shirts as they sing.
Roter Mond über’m Silbersee,
Feuerglut, wärmt den kalten Tee.
Kiefernwald in der Nacht
und noch ist der neue Tag nicht erwacht
Red moon over a silver lake
Fire glows, warms the cold tea
Pine forest in the night
and the new day is not yet awake
And then it’s time for a French chanson.
Two Lac du Bois staff members teach the song text, two others join in to accompany the song leaders with guitars when everyone is ready to learn the melody.
Enfant de la montagne
J’y retourne, j’y retourne
Enfant de la montagne
J’y retourne en chantant
La fatigue me gagne
Mais mon coeur est content
La fatigue me gagne
Mais mon coeur est content
Child of the mountain
I return there, I return there
Child of the mountain
I return singing
Tiredness sets in
But my heart is happy
Tiredness sets in
But my heart is happy
Something which is a constant across teachers and languages is the language beyond the text that the teachers use to teach the songs. These are instructions and moments when the leaders need to get the whole group doing the same thing. For example, when the Italian song leaders want everyone to repeat after them as they sing, they say verso doppo verso, or “line by line.” All the students have been trained to shout out verso doppo verso with a gesture. When the French sing a whole song together the leaders say Tous ensemble, as in “everyone together,” and the entire group of French students yells out Tous ensemble tous ensemble ouai ouai !
You think they might get tired of this, but it’s just the opposite, really. By knowing and performing the rituals they all fit in, they form a community, everyone belongs. The fact that the rituals include language mean that long after this experience is over they are going to remember these phrases, and of course they will come up in other contexts, in their non-English language lives anyway, when it is just the right thing to say. They’ll just have to make sure to leave the gestures out or people might wonder!
To truly represent Switzerland’s language heritage, I suppose at this point the counselors could insert a song in Romansh, Switzerland’s fourth language. But it’s likely that no one knows one, and they don’t, and I’ve got nothing to offer them either. I just want to give Romansh speakers a shout out here. You, too, have a linguistic inheritance worth celebrating!
As a finale, the song leaders from all three programs, German, French, and Italian, climb on the stage for a song that everyone has learned, in the language of their program. I know it from my time in the German Village as a song about bringing in the grain before the rain arrives. In French and Italian the lyrics are about the morning winds.
Quite a moment, all these American children singing in multiple world languages together.* I’ve been told from time to time, as a teacher trainer, that high school students won’t sing in world language classes. I know better, as does anyone who has ever passed through the gates of these Language Villages.
All these American children singing in multiple world languages in honor of my Switzerland. I feel proud, thankful, and amazed. As they are invited into the Paris building for dinner, I quietly step back toward the woods and down the path to my parked rental car. Returning here, for the classes and activities and now a tribute to my new home, has been a very private and meaningful experience, one of nostalgia, a sense of lost youth, and above all, hope for the future.
*These three songs, in Italian, German, and French, were then sung in a round as well. Pure joy.
Vento sottile, vento del mattino
Vento che scuoti la cima del mio pino
Vento che danzi, che balli
la gioia tu ci porti
Vento sottile
He ho spann den Wagen an
denn der Wind treibt Regen übers Land
Hol die gold’nen Garben, hol die gold’nen Garben
He ho, spann den Wagen an
Vent frais, vent du matin
Vent qui souffle au sommets des grands pins
Joie du vent qui passe
Allons dans le grand vent