“I see it as a Gift from God,” says one Kentucky educator
By Kristin Clark Taylor
From Dream to Reality
Twenty-five years is a long, long time to hold onto a dream.
Arianne Johnson can attest to it.
Johnson, a K–5 general music teacher at Lexington Christian Academy in Lexington, Kentucky, has been an educator for almost twenty-five years – and for the entirety of her teaching career, she’s held onto a dream.
Her dream is rooted in both the divine and the musical.
“For the entire time I’ve been teaching,” Johnson says, “I’ve wanted to find a classroom resource that offers my students a Christian worldview that fits comfortably into a music curriculum.”
Johnson, also a 4th and 5th-grade elementary chorus director, says she has searched and searched over the years, occasionally finding resources that almost hit the mark … but were “just not all that engaging.”
“There are plenty of curriculum writers who put textbook-type songs out there,” she concedes.
And here, a diplomatic pause.
“But I found most of those resources to be kind of dated – nothing that really excited my students,” she adds with diplomacy and grace.
All of that changed last summer, however, when she and her husband took a tour of QuaverEd’s headquarters during a trip to Nashville.
While talking with the staff and sharing her classroom experiences as a K–5 music teacher in a Christian school, she happened upon a bit of very happy news: The company had just begun developing a faith-based, elementary music curriculum called QuaverChristian.
Naturally, Johnson was joyous and jubilant. Why?
Because her dream had just been transformed into reality.
Harmonizing Faith and Music Education
Today, Arianne Johnson is one of the first elementary educators to pilot QuaverChristian — and she says she’s beyond thrilled to use the resource every single day in her classroom.
So are her students.
Gone are the rote, sometimes somber Sunday-school recitations pulled straight from the textbook.
During a recent visit to Quaver headquarters in Nashville, educator Arianne Johnson says,”QuaverChristian gives my students the opportunity to play out God’s creation through music!”
“Faith-based learning doesn’t have to always be somber and serious,” she reflects. “I love how QuaverChristian brings God’s work to life through songs and movement! My students are really into it!”
Johnson’s cup runneth over.
“Everybody really loves the Scripture songs!” she observes, “and when my students are ‘rapping it out,’ they’re using their whole brain and their whole body!”
The fun, fast-paced, faith-filled curriculum offers more than 200 ready-made lessons and a healthy variety of support tools, including Scripture songs, chapel resources, and Bible verses.
Says Johnson: “This resource touches all aspects of my students’ learning, and what really excites me is how music is used as the medium to tie everything together.”
Indeed, QuaverChristian provides a golden thread that weaves together faith, learning, and the joy of music in a way that is relevant, relatable, and refreshingly fun.
“We use the Bible to guide us through life, and this curriculum allows us to use music as the tool that flows through it all,” she says.
“God’s word runs through everything,” she continues, “and by using this music-based platform, we can learn even more about Scripture, about ourselves, and about living life as Christians.”
Enhanced Learning at Every Level
QuaverChristian enriches learning by integrating music with core subjects and by fostering engagement through interactive, multicultural, and bilingual resources accessible to all.
The accredited-aligned resource also allows teachers to easily create and assign custom assessments and seamlessly track student progress, adjusting instruction as necessary.
“As soon as I got back from Nashville,” she says with joy in her voice, “I went straight to my principal and said, ‘I really want this!”
QuaverChristian infuses life into every lesson (and sometimes even laughter) — a divine process in and of itself.
“It’s so important for kids to understand that it’s not just about opening the Bible and memorizing verses, but bringing these concepts to life and having fun doing it.”
It’s something she’s been dreaming about for twenty-five years.
And now, it’s become a reality.
For more information on how to get Quaver into your school, visit QuaverEd.com/Christian.
Kristin Clark Taylor is an author and a journalist.
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