Honu are back in the classroom!

They're back!

It felt like the first day of school for the year.  But it wasn't.  The class made their way back into the classroom with a range of different feelings, some shy, excited, anxious and glad to name only a few.  Everyone tried to talk to everyone at once! 

To set the scene we had a circle time and discussed highlights and lowlights of lockdown, followed by hygiene reminders to keep each other safe.  

Thanks to Te Rito Toi, we dived into drama where we imagined that we were in family groups in a traditional Chinese village.  There were many phases and chances to reflect.   The learners in Honu had no hesitation about slipping in and out of their role and were tremendous at acting out their scenes.  

• First each family group had time to sketch what they thought that the village would look like.
   
  
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• Then it was time to act out the first scene where the villagers were happily going about their day as a family unit.
• Next the family unit was able to interact with the wider community during the harvest.
  
  
• Then the Jade Emperor was introduced, he liked to watch the happy villagers from his castle in the sky, but he was lonely and jealous so he sent his Magic Goose down to burn the village.  His kindly maid went to warn the village that there were only two ways to stop the goose, soothing music and a cage.  

  

  The kindly maid telling the Jade Emperor what the happy village people are doing.  

  
   
• The villagers swung into action and initially the attempts to create music and a cage were disjointed but then it came together.  The precise actions and purposeful activity was so genuinely acted out.
  
  
• After the Magic Goose was caged, they realised they needed to trick the Jade Emperor into thinking the village had burned and hence the first lantern festival was reenacted.
    
• However the kindly maid  returned to say the Emperor was miserable and even lonelier then before, and that he wanted her to tell him how he could be happy and kind again.  The villagers suggested all sorts of lovely ideas and she returned to the Jade Emperor. 
• Lastly the villagers put their grand plan into action and pleased the Emperor so much that he was happy that they were still alive and forgave them for trapping his Magic Goose. 
  
   
• But, what will they do with the Magic Goose?

  

  Honu learners combined forces to become the Magic Goose.
  
  

  Participating in this drama allowed the learners a way to process the lockdown period as it was designed to support learners to indirectly reflect while acting out the different parts of the story.  Many learners realised that there was a link and that the threat of the Magic Goose was similar to COVID-19 and their korero around this was very powerful, we talked about how they felt when threatened by the goose, when they realised there were ways to prevent the threat, when they carried out their grand plan.  Very worthwhile learning took place.