Celebrating the Mid-Autumn Festival

The Mid-Autumn Festival is also known as a day of family reunion. Benenden Bilingual School Guangzhou (BBSG) celebrated its first Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day with the whole community. The school's Culture Academy and Moral Education Department planned and conducted a series of traditional Chinese cultural activities for our students, parents, and teachers.

When it comes to the Mid-autumn festival, the myths of Houyi and Chang'e are always in the spotlight. A group of BBSG G7 students leveraged a few classes in a short period to practise and rehearse for a Story Theatre play in a bilingual format. Adapted the original myths, students vividly presented how Chang'e and Houyi saved their people and why Chang'e flew to the Moon Palace in a two-minute perf Not only has the story both romantic and heroic moments, but also the profound messages of traditional culture and family reunion that Mid-Autumn Festival implies.

During the rehearsals, students have furthered their understanding of the customs of the Mid-Autumn Festival through the script, additionally, they have made huge progress in performing arts. The play was a great success, receiving rounds of applause and good comments from the students and teachers. It marked a good start for the Performing Arts Season of the academic year.

In ancient Chinese legend, the rabbit was also one of the first to ascend to the Moon Palace, known as Jade Hare. The connection between the rabbit and the moon is first found in Qu Yuan's poem, "the Questions to Heaven", that the Moon could nurture a rabbit. Fu Xuan's "Questions Proposed to the Heaven" also described a scene of rabbit mashing and blending herb medicines at the Moon Palace.

Participating in various activities carried out by each Homeroom class, students have learnt and experienced more about the cultural elements and charm of the Mid-autumn festival.

With the guidance and supervision of their teachers, students of G1 to G3 made paper lanterns by using materials, such as felt cloths, double-sided tapes and pens etc. They also wrote down their best wishes for their families on customised cards.

G4 and G5 students learnt basic rubbing techniques with their teachers, one of the Chinese intangible cultural heritages. Students tried to imprint traditional patterns, words or phrases about the Mid-Autumn Festival on carved stone tablets, experiencing the essence of this distinctive Chinese craft. 

G6 students also made lanterns, but different from their younger peers, what they explored was the craftsmanship of traditional wooden lanterns, and lighting them up by input LED lights, integrating materials from nature and electronic components with their own creativities and crafting skills.

G7 and G8 students were well prepared for the day with knowledge about the moon phase. They picked the right moon shapes on their birth dates from the moon phase and made wishes, exploring more about the phases of the moon and the magic of it. 

The Mini Mid-Autumn Fair in the afternoon were more bustling with parents’ participation.

The engagement stalls such as Chinese calligraphy, lantern riddles, fan painting, and pitch-pot game, all made the BBSG community full of joy and laughter. 

The flash mob choir performance My Motherland and Me sent the school’s best wishes to the 74th National Day.

The Culture Academy is one of the four BBSG signature programmes, it is dedicated to celebrating cultural immersion in Chinese values and traditions, strengthening students’ sense of self-identity through community engagement. BBSG students will study and experience all things Chinese while developing respect for other cultures. Today’s celebration is the first cultural activity involving everyone at BBSG and led by the Culture Academy since the school opening. In the future, we will present you with more cultural feasts with all graders. Not only in class time, but also in daily school life, students will be given opportunities of having immersive experiences of different cultures. 

Culture is a defining feature of everybody, the glow of Chinese civilization has been continuing in millennium history precipitation. At BBSG, a China-based school, we believe that students who understand China and Chinese culture will be more Future World Ready.