A stream of third graders walked in a large music room, greeted by teacher Tasha Morse. A drum set and a guitar were in direct view with music stands and chairs piled to the side, which made ample space for everyone to come together on a sizeable colorful rug in the center of the room. Soon the sound of their footsteps stopped but their chatter continued until Morse began instructing them, telling them they had a half hour to sing two songs – the state song and a local one – leaving enough time for practice. They’ve been working on the songs for the last few weeks during music class, which is twice a week.
Wrangell third graders have carried on a tradition, singing songs about Alaska and Wrangell, for over 20 years on Alaska Day, which was Friday.
“We’re gonna give Wrangell our very, very best,” Morse said. “Let’s do it one more time. It’s real short. It’s only a minute and 17 seconds long.”
A third grade boy, in disbelief, said “What? “
“Only one minute and 17 seconds,” Morse said.
“That’s long,” he responded.
Though how long a minute and 17 seconds feels varies for individuals, the third graders sang The Alaska Flag Song regardless.
“Eight stars of gold on a field of blue…,” they sang, with a piano that played through a speaker in the background.
Morse has taught music at Evergreen Elementary for 17 years.
And ever since she started, she continues on with the tradition of Wrangell third graders singing the Alaska Flag song. For years, they used to visit Island of Faith Lutheran Church during the elders’ luncheon to sing for them every Alaska Day.
“We would always bus the kids down and they would sing the Alaska Flag Song and the Wrangell song, which was actually written by my mother-in-law, many, many moons ago,” Morse said. “They would go and they would sing those two songs for our elders for a luncheon and then COVID kind of did away with that.”
Morse said that they had to get creative to continue on with bringing joy to the Wrangell community. And the solution was inviting KSTK to record and share it through the radio airwaves back in 2021.
“It was something that I kind of stepped into when I was a new teacher here,” she said. “It was just that was the tradition. That’s what they did. And so I kind of kept that tradition going, and then it went away and so we just wanted to try to keep the tradition alive, even if we couldn’t leave the school to go do it.”
Chattering in the background could be heard between the third graders after they sang the Alaska Flag Song. But they’re ready to sing the other song they’ve been practicing.
As the 16 kids sat on the large rug, Morse told them it’s now time to sing the Wrangell Song. She pulled up the words on a large screen in case anyone forgets the lyrics.
She asked, “How many times do I strum?”
“Four,” they said.
“There’s four little strums before we get to sing,” Morse said. “I’m gonna make sure we’re in tune first, because we don’t want to have an out of tune guitar. Oh yeah. We’re a little out…“
She then told some of the boys in the back to split up so everyone gives their best attention to the song.
Soon, Morse strums the guitar and the kids sang the catchy melody “…Wrangell, Wrangell is an island. Wrangell is our town. It’s small, it’s quiet, it’s peaceful…”
While they sang, some of the third graders held their hands up in the air and made gestures.
Though they practiced a few times, Morse told the students that it’s ok if anyone makes a mistake while singing.
She asks them, “Are you human?”
“Yes,” they responded.
“So we make mistakes, right? It’s what you do with those mistakes that makes life better, right? If you just keep making a mistake, you go, ‘Oh, man, I made a mistake,’ and all you do is think about the mistake,” Morse said. “That’s hard. But if you make a mistake and you go, ‘you know what? I can do it. I can do it’. And you can do it.”
As for the gestures some students made while singing, they said sometimes it tells their classmates to be quiet and other times it signals where they are in the songs.
“This is ‘quiet coyote,’” a third grade girl said. “It usually doesn’t work because we have a very loud classroom, but if it does work, it just means to quiet down.”
So ‘quiet coyote’ is with your index and pinky finger up.
“It’s like rock and roll, except the two fingers in the middle are like a little clamp thing,” another third grader said.
Then there’s ‘quiet froggy.’ That’s when the coyote’s ears bend down at the index and pinky fingers.
KSTK isn’t the only way someone can hear Wrangell’s third graders sing the Alaska Flag Song. Last year’s third grade class can be heard singing it in Juneau’s Children’s Exploration Center in the Alaska State Museum. It’s a touch button with the song on loop.
“I think that’s pretty fantastic,” Morse said. “It shows our kids in our small school that they are capable of awesome things. It’s not every third grade class in Alaska that gets to say, ‘That’s my voice at the State Museum.’ So it’s just a really cool opportunity.”
Although the Wrangell’s Alaska Flag Song is now commemorated at the museum in Juneau, Morse still plans to carry on the tradition of singing it and the Wrangell song on Alaska Day for the Wrangell community each year.
