What’s in Mrs. Winders’ music classroom?
Practically in the lobby of Lucama Elementary School, Jana Winders’ music classroom bursts with color and sound. Enter the building, take an immediate right, and you’ll be walking into the land of toads, play posters, newspaper clippings, and most importantly, music.
“The things that are up in my room celebrate the kids,” said Winders.
Flanking the doorway are articles from the local paper on student choir performances. A bulletin board across the room has hundreds of pictures of students, past and present, that she has taught in her 24 years at Wilson County Schools (WCS).
The summer before she began teaching over two decades ago at this small rural school, the only thing left in the teacher supply store was frogs. She bought them all and thought it would be a temporary theme in her classroom.
The message, ‘Toadally Awesome Classes,’ with the cut-out croakers, still hangs beside the newspaper clippings on the wall. Her amphibians have multiplied, as students bring her gifts of green to add to the collection, which is now all over the classroom. She teaches three days a week at this school and spends the other two days at Vick Elementary.
Winders loves to travel and loves the theater. Posters of Broadway plays line one wall. Another bulletin board says “Music is Global,” centered with a world map and adorned with pins of the places Winders has visited.
She uses the map to talk about music from around the world and incorporates it into her lessons. Winders hopes that if students see her travel, they can imagine themselves traveling too.
“I was a small town girl with big dreams,” said Winders, who was born and raised in Wilson and is this year’s NC Symphony recipient of the Maxine Swalin Award for Outstanding Music Educator.
Outside of the classroom, Winders is a member of the North Carolina Music Educators Association (NCMEA) and is currently serving as president-elect of the NCMEA elementary board. She works with the Whirlikidz, a choir of elementary students from across Wilson County who sing at various events in and around the region.
“Being in a small, rural town, my kids — some of them — have never left the county, much less the state,” Winders said as she talked beside the map.
She sees herself in her students and wants to show them all the possibilities — in and outside — of the region.
Starting March 26, she will have some big help exposing students to music outside of Wilson, thanks to the North Carolina Symphony (NCS). An education concert is scheduled for all fifth graders of WCS, kicking off a multiyear music residency for Wilson County.
Music residency in Wilson
An NCS residency focuses on one location and brings different musical experiences over a concentrated time to students and their communities at large.
According to a NCS press release, the residency will provide programming that includes, “interactive Ensembles in the Schools performances for elementary students; PNC Grow Up Great Music Discovery events combining music and literacy for preschoolers and their families; and musician workshops in which NCS musicians coach middle and high schoolers on technique and musicianship, culminating in a side by side performance in 2028.”
NC Symphony articles
Outside of school programming, the NCS hopes to partner with local organizations like Wilson Arts, Wilson County Senior Activity Center, and perform at the Wilson Whirligig Festival.
Winders believes the arts community in her county is untapped, and those outside the region are unaware of all the activity already happening. “The arts are alive and well in Wilson,” she said.
“I think the residency is going to bring light to a lot of the different programs, not just with the youth, but with our senior citizens, with our local arts council, (and) with the folk art community in Wilson,” Winders said. “I think the residency is just going to be amazing for our town.”
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The immersive NCS residency will complement the art influence already coursing through Wilson, starting with the music education concert on March 26 for all WCS fifth graders.
When it comes to music education, Winders believes music in school is vital.
“I believe in educating the whole child, and in order to do that, you’ve got to pull from different modalities. And so arts education is one of those things that has to be an integral part of education from kindergarten through high school,” said Winders. “It’s essential to students having a whole education.”
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Editor’s note: The Anonymous Trust, which supports the NCS residency, also supports the work of EdNC.
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