Abdulrahman Kanoo School Diyar (ARKS) celebrated Chinese New Year for the second time. The programme acknowledged the Chinese New Year- Year of the Dragon, in the presence of the Chinese Embassy, ARKEDU Trustees, the Chinese Confucius Institutes (CI), Dragon City and ARKS Diyar students’ parents. The morning programme saw the children celebrated with a variety of activities that showcased the rich Chinese culture; including a Chinese wishing tree exercise, student-performed Chinese music, a meet and greet with Didi, and a Dragon performance.
To explore Chinese culture, the teachers at ARKS Diyar made their own wishing tree and the students had the chance to practise the Chinese tradition. As it’s known, people travel at Lunar or Chinese New Year and during other Festivals to leave their own special wishes. The colourful red wishing paper was brought back from China via our Mandarin Teachers, Ms Rong, “学生们把自己的新年愿望通过传统中国剪纸艺术或者“福”“春”等吉祥字呈现出来，亲自挂在自己做的龙年许愿树上，在切身感受中国春节文化习俗的同时他们也对新的一年充满了无限期待” “To make their wishes, students were encouraged to practise paper-cutting which is a folk art that has more than one thousand years of history , or to colour the most auspicious Chinese characters, students’ works carry their wishes for the year of the dragon and all the wishes were hung on the tree according to the tradition”.
This year the students had a meet and greet with a special guest, Didi. Didi is little brother in Mandarin Chinese, is an adorable, fun and friendly dragon and the character which was sponsored by Dragon City Bahrain. The smiles and joy were touched in the students’ faces. The Mandarin language contest was runned by Miss. Kim during the assembly and the students were rewarded with Chinese colouring books. All staff and students were encouraged to wear traditional Chinese dress or red for the day. With the school’s strong values of engaged citizens and robust partnerships within the community and abroad, the event falls in line with our late Founders vision. ARKS is the only school in the Kingdom to offer Mandarin from Reception to Yr 6 (currently).
Speaking about the event, ARKS Diyar Mandarin Teacher Ms. Rong said: “I am proud to teach the future leaders in Bahrain the Mandarin Language.“ Today, I can confirm that we are the first and the leaders of the Mandarin language programme. Students at ARKS Diyar are learning the rich Chinese culture, which will enable them to discover new things and broaden their horizons. By the next academic year we will be exploring the Mandarin program with our Year 7,8 and 9.”
Special Thanks to Dragon City Bahrain, Chinese Embassy in Bahrain and the Chinese Confucius Institutes (CI).