The traditional Chinese Qingming Festival was originated from Zhou Dynasty, which has a history of over 2,500 years. Also called the Spring Outing Festival, Qingming is the time for our ancestor worshiping and tomb sweeping. Qingming Festival, together with the Spring Festival, Dragon Boat Festival and Mid-autumn festival, are called the four traditional festivals in China.
In Chinese Studies Classes, Year 5 students began their topic study of Qingming Festival and learned about the origin of the festival and its traditional cuisine. They also studied the customs of kite flying, spring outing, tree planting and tomb sweeping for the festival. With the teachers’ instructions, they appreciated the beautiful poetry about Qingming Festival.
In the practical part, the students used color pens to design their own kites. The students from the mainstream class took great interest in matching the poetry with the picture on the kites.
“In lunar February, the grass was growing and the songbirds were singing everywhere. The willows waved along the dyke and the spring moist was in the air.”
“It kept raining and raining during Qingming Festival. The mind of the people in the street was unhinged.”
“There were several peach blossoms booming outside the bamboo forest. The ducks were the first to feel the warmth of the water as the spring approached.”
The students from the non-mainstream class were also very creative. They added the great Chinese touches to the kites they designed such as different kinds of Fu character, various Peking Opera faces, traditional Chinese food, their own-designs of a door-god.
Holding the kites high, the students ran in the warm spring breeze. Those colorful kites looked like several beautiful butterflies flying in the blue sky with the white clouds. Let us wish our students can have the bright future just like the soaring kites in the vast sky freely.
Y5A Co-Teacher – May MEI