On May 23, 2019, the Year 3 Learning Community challenged themselves to a day of life skills. The aim was to develop our leadership, teamwork, listening, problem solving, creativity and positivity.

In preparation for the activities, students had a session with their parents to design a healthy picnic lunch, which they made at home for homework. In the weeks leading up to the event, the children learnt how to sew in order to make a reusable T-shirt bag. They created a design for their T-shirt bag by researching different designs and specifications.

The children began the day by being put into teams, where they decided their team name and the roles that they thought their team would need throughout the day. We had a variety of leaders within each team; money leader, sewing leader, shopping leader and much more. Each team was allocated RMB 500 yuan to cover all costs throughout the day to hone the skill of budgeting in our students. The teams went on to design their evening meal, looking at recipes and writing a team shopping list.

The children then sat in their teams to create the aforementioned healthy picnic. Following our picnic each team took part in team building games where they had to work together to build a "house" from a picture, developing the skills of communication and team work.

In the afternoon, each team took the metro to the supermarket to shop the items according to their shopping lists. Obviously, each team budgeted well and they awarded themselves with an ice cream for great teamwork and budgeting. Once they arrived back at school, each team prepared their evening meal. As a team, they enjoyed the result of their hard work by setting the table and discussing the events of the day.

The Year 3 Learning Community parents then joined for a Closing Ceremony, in which each team presented about a different experience throughout the day – developing presentation skills. A video was shown of all the activities to celebrate our students’ successes. To end the ceremony, the children who had demonstrated a development of life skills were awarded certificates.