Last week we explored the celebration of Chinese New Year which meant the children were introduced and invited to explore a new culture that they may not have experienced before. We spent some time looking at Chinese traditional ribbon dancing and making up our own ribbon dances in the classroom. Another dance the children explored was Dragon Dancing which is where two or more people dress in a dragon costume and dance to the beat of drums. The children also had fun creating lanterns for the celebration. The children made Chinese New Year cards where they explored Chinese Character writing.

The children also explored typical Chinese food by making and preparing a typical noodle dish. After the noodles were cooked the children had an opportunity to try the food and did so using chopsticks however, as you can imagine, most of them found this difficult.

The children also read books based on Chinese New Year; the books were based on how families celebrated Chinese New Year In these books the children saw that children get red envelopes as a gift for the new year; these envelopes usually have money inside. It is also traditional to wear red on this special day and it is also very important to clean the whole house as this is seen as brushing the old year away and welcoming the new year.