We are going native this month. With the start of school closer than our kids would like, it seemed an appropriate time to review a local group called Silly Bus, whose mission is to teach through its music.

True, there are quite a few groups out there now trying to educate and sing at the same time. But this is the first band I have come across that focuses wholly on the Standards of Learning. The Virginia SOLs describe the commonwealth’s expectations for what public school teachers should teach and what children should learn.

Silly Bus has released its third CD, Alphabet Volume 2. Through this CD and its predecessor, Alphabet Volume 1, Silly Bus set out to teach the fundamentals of early elementary education, specifically phonics and whole language, using letters and sounds to help children learn the alphabet.

Working with Kim Gorenflo, a teacher using the Ready, Set, Read! Program, Silly Bus started writing songs based on her curriculum.

But don’t assume that in the effort to instruct, Silly Bus forgot to entertain. Because they have such a talented pool of production people behind them, not only the musicians themselves contributed to the music, but anyone in the company with an idea of how to make a song more fun or energetic could give their input.

The result are CDs that run the gamut from indie rock, blues, country, even a little rap, including their most popular down-load, “History Hip Hop,” which debuted on the first album, Silly Bus.

Silly Bus can sound like old-school U2, the Wallflowers or Jack Johnson, yet some songs sound like The Kinks or The Proclaimers, maybe even a little David Bowie. When pressed to name some influences, Silly Bus guitarist John Henneberger cited Bruce Hornsby and Dave Matthews as some musicians his team grew up with, but said the group’s greatest inspiration comes from their children.

The simple lyrics are both appeal-ng and addictive. Right before bed-time, I heard my son singing the chorus to “Pumpkin Patch”—“Pumpkin patch, pumpkin patch, planted some seeds, now they are growing fast”—over and over again, which, although it could have been annoying, was charming to me since I’m his mother.

“Anna Ate Apples,” another popular download, begins, “Once there was a little letter ‘a’ who said to the capital letter ‘A,’ ‘One day I’ll be like you. I could start a sentence too.’” Frankly, I’m not sure my children picked up on the educational part of the music, but we all certainly did enjoy Silly Bus.

Whitney Lou’s 4-year-old daughter Sophie has learned that her special smile will charm her grandparents into doing anything she wishes. They live in the West End with her 3-year-old son, Jax, and her husband, Jeff.

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