Flocabulary Announces Winners of Second Annual Latinx Identities Contest

Flocabulary, the leading video and student creativity platform that uses educational hip-hop to engage students and increase achievement, today announces the winners of its second annual Latinx Identities Contest; John Alex, who won in the Elementary category, and Jaydyen Brown, who claimed the Secondary title. 

In honor of Hispanic Heritage Month, Flocabulary invited students to be the researchers, lyricists and rappers for a student contest. Students from all over the country were challenged to select an event, person, tradition or identity tied to Latinx culture to research and write a song about. After reviewing over 270 script submissions, 10 finalists were chosen to submit a video performing their original song, and a team of judges selected a winner in each category. 

Alex, a 5th-grader from Del Mar Union School District in California, celebrates Luis Alveraz in their script. Luis Alveraz was a Nobel Prize-winning physicist and inventor, most famous for the discovery of the iridium layer and his theory that the mass extinction of dinosaurs was caused by an asteroid or comet colliding with Earth. Brown, a 10th-grade student from Beaufort County School District in South Carolina, wrote about the Day of the Dead, also known as Día de los Muertos. This holiday is traditionally celebrated in Mexico on November 1st and 2nd, as families create homemade altars and offer prayer and remembrance of their lost loved ones. 

“It’s an honor to experience students’ celebrations of Latinx heritage, culture and figures. Our student contests provide a unique opportunity to share underrepresented voices and stories through videos that will reach millions of students,” stated Sara Romero-Heaps, Vice President of Product Strategy at Nearpod. “These themes and topics not only celebrate student voice, but also enrich cross-curricular learning all year round, and we’re always excited to see what students come up with.” 

Both Alex and Brown will have their original raps turned into Flocabulary lessons and videos about their chosen historical figures and events. Last year’s winners’ videos on José Hernández and Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz have been played 146,000 times since launching in Flocabulary’s library. Flocabulary, and its sister platform Nearpod, remain steadfast in their commitment to shine a light on topics and figures that have historically been left out of the conversation and provide standards-aligned content that makes it easy for educators to incorporate more diverse stories into their daily lessons. These two students join six others who have had original Flocabulary or Nearpod lessons created from their work. 

To learn more about the winners, click here, and to use Flocabulary to bring more diverse voices into your classroom, be sure to visit: flocabulary.com. 

About Nearpod
Whether using interactive lessons, interactive videos or gamified learning, teachers get real-time insights into student learning with Nearpod. Teachers can upload their existing content and make it interactive using Nearpod’s more than 20 formative assessment and rich-media features so that all learning is active and collaborative. In addition, Nearpod’s libraries feature over 15,000 standards-aligned lessons, videos and activities created in partnership with leading publishers like Common Sense Education and Smithsonian. Nearpod’s companion platform Flocabulary engages students in K-12 standards-aligned hip-hop videos and instructional activities that increase reading comprehension through academic vocabulary exposures. Together, Nearpod and Flocabulary reach the 100 largest school districts in the US and are used by over 1.7 million educators worldwide. In March 2021, Nearpod was acquired by Renaissance, a global leader in assessment, reading and math solutions for pre-K-12 schools and districts. To learn more about Nearpod, visit www.nearpod.com. For more information about Renaissance, visit www.renaissance.com.

Contact Information

Rachel Stoczko

Communications Manager

Nearpod

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