Chinese celebrations come alive in Welsh classrooms
22 February 2022
This year’s Spring Festival attracted thousands of pupils from across Wales, with almost 100 teachers signing their classes up for the day-long event, the recorded sessions, or both.
“An innovative and interesting insight into Chinese culture for our pupils.”
Children from Years 1 to 13 enjoyed a diverse range of live interactive and recorded sessions to welcome in the Year of the Tiger. These ranged from:
- story-telling, where children listened to classic myths about the ‘door gods’ and ‘wealthy gods’ of China;
- learning about the Chinese Zodiac, including which animal they were associated with and what that meant;
- discovering all the different foods eaten during this period, and how they vary across the country;
- and learning about the activities that take place at this time such as the colourful 中国中央电视台春节联欢晚会 CCTV Spring Festival Gala, and 冰钓 ice fishing.
“A fun-filled insight into a tradition which has so much history.”
Pupils also took part in interactive workshops on traditional arts and crafts, writing their own Chinese calligraphy and making tigers using the ancient art of paper-cutting.
“A fantastic range of resources - they really did bring the celebration alive in the classroom!”
The pupils who attended the festival live on 1 February even had the opportunity to communicate with the tutors using a Chat option. This proved particularly popular during the story-telling sessions, where children were able to ‘talk’ to the tutor and ask all kinds of questions about mythical beings from Chinese tales.
“We wanted our pupils to have a real Chinese ‘voice’ presenting the lessons.”
Experience the festival for yourself
Learn about the Spring Festival by watching the videos from the day, with your pupils or by yourself.
Following the day-long event on 1 February, the videos were made available on Cardiff University's website. Many teachers chose to use the sessions in this way, if they had missed some on the day or wanted to show them to different classes. The videos can also be used by home educators, as well as anyone interested in learning more about the Spring Festival or gain an insight into the culture of China.
Find the videos here.
Embrace the new Curriculum for Wales
Help your pupils become ethical, informed citizens of the world with more online events from Cardiff Confucius Institute.
This festival was the first of a series of virtual activities planned for schools in 2022. They are designed to give pupils across Wales the opportunity to gain an invaluable insight into key celebrations in China through workshops, talks and interactive sessions.
Our next online celebrations will be held in early summer for the Dragon Boat Festival, and in September/October for the mid-Autumn Festival.
If you would like to stay updated on these two events and other activities by the Wales China Schools Project, sign up to our newsletter here.