[BITList] Hallelujah Chorus a different take

[John Feltham]

This is along read but….

Enjoy. Sorry about the advert.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=LyviyF-N23A


Turns out the fifth graders at Kuinerrarmiut Elitnaurviat School in Quinhagak, a Yupik village of 550 people located on the Bering Sea coast in Southwest Alaska, decided to take on a class project a couple of weeks ago [actually December 2010] to present at a Christmas program for the entire village. Now that the fifth graders' video is going viral or global or international ... whatever you want to call it ... this video is popping up all over Facebook and beyond.
Alaska Public Radio shared the story and the way it all came together:

“By Wednesday, we knew we did not have enough time to prepare [a program to perform for the Christmas program],” James Barthelman, a fifth grade teacher at the school, said. “So Thursday, I was kind of pacing around the room and thought, let’s just video tape it.”

“So we just sat down as a class and brainstormed a bunch of ideas.”

After the brainstorming session, where the class determined how they wanted the video to look and some of the places where they should record, they settled on a creatively edited, card flipping version of the chorus.
Through organizing that many cards and people, the group, Barthelman included, proved it was up to the challenge of creating and organizing the cards that are used throughout the video.

“I had to stand there and sing the songs, I don’t know how many times,” Mr. Barthelman said, describing how the class was able to time the flipping of the cards to the song.

The 19 members of the class filmed video for three days, using classmates as well as members of the community, and ended up with 100 film clips that were edited by Mr. Barthelman into a final video.

The video was shown at the Christmas program where it was a huge success, and then it was posted to YouTube on Monday, December 20, 2010. By Tuesday it had picked up 400 hits, and on Wednesday afternoon, after only three days on the internet, it had picked up over 18,000 hits. By the time I finished writing this story two hours later, those hits had jumped to almost 24,000. When I checked this morning, that number had grown to more than 74,000 ... and it all began only four days ago.

Christmas flash mob Alaska-style? The fifth graders and Mr. Barthelman in Quinhagak have given a gift to the world and, by making this video the latest internet sensation, the world has given a gift to Mr. Barthelman and his fifth graders. 

Thank you Quinhagak, Alaska ... and Merry Christmas!

The teacher's response to compliments from afar:

Hallelujah Chorus -Kuinerrarmiut Elitnaurviat 5th Grade – Quinhagak, Alaska

Wow!! Thank you for all for the wonderful comments. The village of Quinhagak is glowing because of them. The amount of views is mind blowing!! [a quarter of a million viewings as of Sept. 2011---certainly more by now.] Considering this video was intended for an audience of about 200. As many of you have thought, the kids worked very hard on this project. They put in 10 hours of work shooting all the scenes (on a weekend nonetheless!!) I am very proud of them!

Thank you also for pointing out the apostrophes! I now have a very teachable moment once we start school again. One they will never forget!! I’m just glad I spelled “Hallelujah” correct.

Thank you on behalf of Quinhagak, Alaska!! Merry Christmas!!




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