Saturday, August 17, 2013

Soka Kindergarten 20th Anniversary : Aug-13

All deco were brainchild of Nancy and other SK mummys !
SK celebrates its anniversary once every 5 years. Since a child attends SK for 3 years, there is a 2 in 5 probability that a SK child does not get to participate in an anniversary whilst there. En is fortunate to part take in the 20th anniversary show, and our family is fortunate to be there, as family members and spectators.  Though Victor and I have been chanting for 30 years, we have never had a personal SK experience before this.. All thanks to En now!! (^_^)
Excitedly spotting family members before show began ..

Theme of SK's 20th Anniversary ..
En's class Singing-in-the-Rain performance on stage ..
Everyone singing the theme song "Dream Blossom Inspire"
More than two months before this, Nancy was already cracking her head on how to decorate the school as she had been requested by SK to lead this important mission. Juz because it was Nancy, I volunteered by hands and legs despite being most clueless at deco, handicraft and all those stuff! It was really an eye-opener looking at the end-results from the perspective of a helper; I would not have appreciated all the creativity and hard work put into the decorations merely from an event attendee..

I have never seen SK so packed before. Not only with parents, siblings, teachers and children. Many SK graduates returned to help out at the event as guides, ushers, and even performers. There were activity booths to take pictures; exhibition rooms where selected children's digital art pieces were made into key chains or mounted and put up for sale; classrooms were open for parents to visit and look at their children's work and pictures taken during lessons; sale room where one can buy the newly-launched SK book..

There were simply too many people and hardly room to move around. We juz proceeded to the auditorium and waited for the concert to begin. I invited Jiun and Pa to join us as En hardly has performance opportunity.  Luckily we were able to locate one another despite the huge crowd.. Thereafter we went to buy the $20 book and left shortly.

I remembered Qi and Xuan used to have annual year-end concerts where all the children in the entire childcare centre would perform more than one item for the parents and guests in a rented auditorium. Qi and Xuan were such veterans at dancing and singing on stage, with parents as enthusiastic audience! This was only En's second such experience, the first being her participation in a holiday Chinese theatre program.  I guess SK, with very limited hours as compared to a childcare centre where children easily spend up to 8 hours a day with the teachers, have to prioritize and performance experience like this is really a luxury..

Happily singing.. with Ms Josie at the back ..
En's K2 class put up a dance "Singing in the Rain" and also sang the Dream Blossom Inspire theme song at the finale.. In addition, En's class, in fact every class from nursery to K2, contributed a class effort story or rhyme or poem to the newly-launched SK book "Together We Grow".  This book was really very interesting as all the works and illustrations were done by the students themselves with the facilitation and help from their teachers.

En drew a crab which became an illustration in the book as part of her class' combined storytelling efforts! In other words, her class contribution in the book is a story with illustrations. The story came about when the K2 children, after learning about sea creatures, took turns to contribute a line or idea to create and complete the story in class, facilitated by their teacher. Every story, rhyme, poem or illustration was
Launch of "Together We Grow" SK book !
unique and decided by its class children! That book became En's favourite book at bedtime or reading time for the next two weeks as she plough through all the English and Chinese stories in it.. (:

SK indeed offers a unique education experience to the children and I am really glad En has the good fortune to receive and be part of it...

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