Students Celebrate Dragon Boat Festival with Their Own Crafts

Upper School students who are studying Chinese celebrated the Dragon Boat Festival with food and fun. 端午节 duānwǔjié, the Dragon Boat Festival, is a traditional Chinese festival that falls on the fifth day of the fifth month in the lunar calendar. This year that date was June 10. “It was a perfect activity for the last week of school,” said Maggie Gilbride, Upper School Mandarin teacher. “Often the festival falls after the school year is done, but since we were still in session this year, I knew we had to do something special!” 

Students first learned about dragon boats, intricately carved traditional boats in Chinese culture that were originally rowed to ward off misfortune and encourage rain. Then they headed to the EC3 Design Center to construct their own boats. Students made a variety of different dragon boats from popsicle sticks and cardboard tape, decorated with tempera paint. On June 10, the class headed to Fanno Creek on the OES campus and released their boats, watching their successful (and not so successful) crafts float down the creek before being retrieved. They also celebrated by making and eating 粽子 zòngzi, a traditional celebratory food made of glutinous rice with various sweet and savory fillings wrapped in bamboo leaves. Everyone brought something they wanted to put inside their 粽子 and ate together, enjoying the end of the year.

 端午节快乐 duānwǔjié kuàilè—Happy Dragon Boat Festival!