by Jackie Pollack
Getting bored of listening to the same songs for the past three months? Lucky for you, Ms. O’Connor’s English classes have been working on a collaborative Spotify playlist composed of songs suggested by her students and the Irvington faculty. The “Pandemic Playlist” currently includes over eighty songs and is still growing based on class suggestions.
The idea for the playlist came about when Ms. O’Connor asked her students in her writing class for some ideas of a project they would like to do. One student requested to write about songs that have a personal meaning attached to them.
Ms. O’Connor said, “We talked a little and we eventually thought about writing about a song that we had been listening to more than usual during the pandemic. I asked the kids to write to the prompt — Why this song? Why now?”
Writing about songs gave Ms. O’Connor the idea of creating a playlist filled with everyone’s current favorites. The playlist encompasses artists from The Beatles to Post Malone and includes classics such as “Bohemian Rhapsody” by Queen.
Ms. O’Connor invited all of her students, as well as staff and administrators, to add any song that they enjoy listening to. Therefore, every song is inspired by a different person and holds a certain significance to them.
The Pandemic Playlist can be streamed on Spotify, and Ms. O’Connor suggests trying a thirty day free trial to get started.
Check it out: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6eZGLLs7vLm4sx05wKh072?si=Z6TqnctuT-WTlE8xNW79gw