Kat Harris

Have any of you classroom teachers used musicals to teach other subjects? I don't just mean analyzing a musical in English class like you would any other literary work (although I'm curious about that, too!)--I mean using Pacific Overtures to teach students about the opening of Japan, or using Caroline or Change to look at the Civil Rights movement. For those of you that have, what are your experiences? What are some of the challenges you've faced--like a classroom of kids who hate musicals--and how have you overcome them? How do you use the cast album? Do you just focus on the text? If you haven't used musicals in your lessons, why not? Is that something you'd be open to?