On Tuesday morning 13.2. At 9.00 they arrived to Jalavapuisto School, just like we’ve agreed: Connie, Maggie, Chun Yin, Jonas, Rene, Chau Ming, Josephine, Kit and Flora. Some of them were from our friend school Holm Glad 2. And some were Ediversity personnel.

That morning the whole Jalavapuisto School was gathered in the gym because of the assembly. Our 9 guests were welcomed to our school by the ’Japu-song’ (Japu=Jalavapuisto).

Then they were divided into 3 groups and 6K girls and boys took them to the guided tour around the school. Both the guests and the guides seemed to be pleased and their conversation went on after the tour ended.

From 10 til 14.15 it was time for the visitors to either keep or observe the lessons. They were now operating in two groups and visiting the classes 2K, 3K, 4K and 6K.

My on class 2K got a chance to learn to write Chinese letters in Calligraphy lesson. There were 5 teachers telling and leading the children to the ’secrets’ of Chinese way of writing. 2K end up writing the word ’Blessing’ on the beautiful red rice paper. The paper should be turned upside down and attach on the door at the time of Chinese New Year celebration, that’s what we were told. The second lesson we spent with the questions 2K had made for our guests. We all learned so much!

During that day I had to pinch myself few times: Can this really be happening?! Are they really here after almost 1,5 year co-operation? The email about their coming in early October…and now they are here!

Many, many emails, pictures, videos have been sent during this time. My class has been studying and learning about Hong Kong at the Science- and Arts lessons. And now all the studying really showed to be worth of something!

”Welcome to Hong Kong. Let’s not end this collaporation now”, were the last words from them for our principal and me before they left.

Mäkynen Hanna

On Monday February 12th our dear guests (14) from Hong Kong arrived. It was so nice to finally meet them after chatting with them through Skype, email and seeing some videos and pictures! I really appreciate the fact that they came to see us and had also prepared lessons!

Theme of the week was friendship because of Valentine’s Day. The student’s union had planned a colour week. Each day we had a colour in which we were encouraged to dress. The colour of Monday was red. We started the day by going to see our schools talent show “Mestarit lavalla”. Children had prepared many performances (dancing, singing, gymnastics, hobby introduction video etc.) and a small group of teachers (including me) performed too. Together we also sang a song about friendship, in English. Our guests really enjoyed the show and they appreciated the fact that the kids had really prepared the performances all by themselves without teachers’ involvement.

Then we all went outside during break time. They were amazed on how freely we let the kids play outside. They were wondering why we don’t have fences and more teachers monitoring the break time so that the kids won’t get hurt.

After the break we gathered together to have some tea and discuss about our school. Besides me, there were also our principal Pirjo and one of our teachers Heidi. Our time ran out so we didn’t have that much time to introduce our school properly. But I sent the introduction slides and our weekly schedules to Cam later.
After lunch we went to say hi to a number of classes and then it was already time for them to go.

On Tuesday and Wednesday they organized lessons for 4th, 3rd and 5th graders. First they told us some things about their culture and especially about the Chinese New Year. Then they asked the students to prepare a drum using toilet paper cones and some extra material. It was great to see how excited the kids were and how they used their creativity in making different drums. Then we’d sing a Chinese song and play those drums. What a lot of fun that was! 😊

On Tuesday and Wednesday the guests went to observe some lessons to different classrooms. On Wednesday there was also a magic show by a real magician. Our student’s union had requested it. On Wednesday the guests also interviewed our principal before leaving.

I hope they had a lovely trip here in Finland! It sure was amazing to have them here!

Greetings,
Linda