Happy Easter

Happy Easter!
For the past week WPIPS has been alive with Easter preparations in all forms! We learnt a bit about what Easter is all about and why we celebrate it, and what Easter means to the students.
We also did a lot of crafts, in particular our pinatas that we made filled with Easter eggs and that we plan to smash this afternoon (a full tutorial coming soon).

Virginie showing off her pinata (finished product coming soon...)

Then we made made our Easter baskets that were adorably cute, with a little chick on the side.

Virginie with her finished basket!

The cute little chick on Guillaume's basket

Guillaume posing with his basket

Virginie's Easter Basket: very impressive!

 And here is a photo of the baskets that Max, Emilie and Anne-Priscilla made last April:

 Max, Emilie and Anne-Priscilla's Easter baskets of 2011

We'd love to know which baskets you prefer. The Easter baskets of 2011 or 2012? We love the bows from the 2011 baskets but the little chick on the 2012 baskets is so cute!


We also did some serious work too, but that was just as fun! We wrote some really neat letters to the Easter Bunny! This gave us a great chance to revise the parts of a letter. Guillaume and Virginie really liked knowing about the Easter Bunny because in France bells bring the chocolate instead.

Bonnie writing her letter to the Easter Bunny

We did so much work to make this an Easter never to forget, so we were very pleased (and surprised) when we went to the schools this morning to find a very pleasant sight! Proof of the Easter Bunny in many forms! While we didn't actually see him, we did see...
His footprints,

These footprints didn't belong to any of us...

His reply to our Easter letters,
And of course... chocolate! Virginie and Guillaume were so happy to have some Toblerone to munch on whilst they finished their pinatas.

Very happy chappys!

Guillaume was happy to see his basket filled

Thanks a lot Easter Bunny! What a great Easter at WPIPS! We haven't finished yet though, we have to go smash those pinatas (don't they look impressive?) and get searching for Easter Eggs because we are having an Easter egg hunt!


So tell us, what did you do for Easter? While we are on the topic, we my as well show what we got up to last year. Unfortunately we didn't have time this year (in between all the other awesome stuff we've been up to), but at Easter last year, we dyed eggs... It was messy, but so much fun, and we got to eat the eggs after for breakfast on Easter Sunday. (Hint: if dying your own eggs, hardboil them first, then decorate/dye because we didn't think about that and although we used food colouring, when we hardboiled them, all the dye came out :( Still so much fun and really yummy!)

Maxime and Anne-Priscilla dying eggs

Everybody at WPIPS hopes you had a really great Easter, because we sure did!

Christmas Concert and Prizegiving Ceremony 2011

Last night was the night of our second annual... Christmas Concert and Prizegiving Ceremony 2011! Once again, the concert was held at WPIPS and we had many budding actors and actresses set to impress! We started the evening as normal before the came across a (planned) dilemma! None of the costumes were right! Some had been ruined and no one had any idea why! So instead of our "original performance" we had to watch a bit of TV (at least while we were trying to solve the dilemma). The TV programs were good though, they had a Christmas around the World theme and covered Mexico, France, England, India, Australia and Hollywood! Plus they were in 3D so that made it even better! 

Alivia wearing her 3D glasses

Kerrie looked stunning in her 3D glasses

Georgie loved her 3D glasses

And the Mexican cake!

Yohan found the "Jesus" figurine!
 

The Mexican dancing was great fun!

Then just at the end of the Mexican program, someone must have changed the channel (no idea who, but something tells me it was Brooke, because the remote was found under his chair) seeing as instead of the programmed French channel, an R-rated program turned on! Thankfully we found the remote just in time!

"The following program is classified R-rated, and contains strong violence, sexual scenes and coarse language"

In France, they chopped down and decorated a Christmas Tree (sapin de Noel)

 

And in England, the audience was treated to an interview with the Queen and Kate Middleton

For a while it all went OK, until someone (still no idea who!) unplugged the TV! Luckily, it was just the right time for a break so the audience took the chance to look around the Discovery Room whilst we fixed the TV.

In the Discovery Room during the break

Or for those who had already checked out the Discovery Room, Hugh and Santa (Jesse) gave an amusing show.

And just as we thought nothing else would happen, something went wrong with the 3D and while the 3D characters tried to interact with the audience, it didn't work and the TV screen smashed! I hope no one got too injured in the process. This latest dilemma meant no TV either to it was a good thing that we managed to get at least one part of our original performance ready. So we all sang "It's A Small World" before awarding the Prince & Princess Book Awards. This years recipients, Amelia and Hugh, really deserved the prizes. Then each staff member and student took the audience back to one of their most memorable parts of the year. A BBQ was a well deserved treat at the end!

Three beautiful Indian dancers

Singing "It's A Small World"

Hollywood Chat Session with Abby and Jo

We never found out who was fiddling around and causing all the dilemmas, but we did catch this elf sneaking past!

Judaism - Potato Latkes

In Room 3 lately, we've been learning about different religions around the world and the festivals they celebrate. We learnt all about Hanukkah, celebrated by Jewish people during late November/ early December each year. First we did a lot of learning and then we made dreidels and played a game with some friends! Then we learnt about the foods eaten at Hanukkah. They include oil to symbolise the miracle that the oil kept the lamps lit for 8 days. And then we made potato latkes!!!!
You can get the recipe for potato latkes here (or you can follow our tutorial)

First, you will need all these ingredients: 1.5kg of potatoes,  2 medium onions (we left them out), 2 eggs, 2 teaspoons of salt, 1/2 teaspoon of pepper (we left that out too), 4 tablespoons of flour, 1 teaspoon of baking powder and some vegetable oil for frying.

Start by grating the potatoes and then place them in a strainer and try to get rid of as much moisture as possible

Add all the other ingredients and mix!

This is what the mixture should look like once all the ingredients have been added

Place 2-3 tablespoons of mixture onto the pan for each latke. Flatten them out and let them cook for about 4-5 minutes per side

Yum! Once the latkes have been fried, place them on some paper towel so that the oil can drain...and enjoy!

We didn't have enough time to make some apple sauce but apparently the two go well together (you can find the recipe on the same link as the potato latkes if you're interested). If you have been inspired and do get cooking this holiday, we'd love to know how your potato latkes turned out because ours were delicious!

Art Fever

Sorry about not getting more info on the sports carnival, we're still waiting for more photos. In the mean time, Miss Alligator and her little artists have been very busy lately. The topic for the art room at the moment is insects, and this is a sneak peak of some of their work:

A display of the amazing ladybird paintings by artistic WPIPS students

Hugh's amazing ladybird painting (Australia)

 Great ladybird by Tiffany (Hong Kong)

Wonderful artwork by Aya (Japan)

Dragonfly - another masterpiece by Aya (Japan)

The whole school has put lots of effort into this (yet-to-be-completed) artwork now on display in the Admin

A few months ago we got crafty amking some bunting and promised a picture of the finished result - so here it is!

A closer view of the bunting, which looked great at the Sports Carnival

         Before the District Directors visit, we got the school looking great by putting our artistic skills to work - here is a glimpse of the pavers out the front of the school that we painted in a sea of rainbow colours

We finally finished the beautiful artwork in the hallway

A closer view of the mural

And finally, Aya (Japan), hard at work!

We'd love a visit from you, so if your around, pop in and see these artistic masterpieces for real, plus our Administration now looks great!

Sports Carnival Part 1

Yesterday was the perfect day for our first ever... drumroll... WPIPS Sports Carnival! The weather was great, a bit windy, but really sunny and lots of fun was had by all! The oval looked great with the bunting we made and some balloons in the colours of the 3 teams - gold, pearl and lilac. It was great that everyone could make it and join in on the fun, and it's only thanks to the awesome parent helpers that the day turned out as good as it was... After the long jump, beanbag throw, running races, skipping races, flag races and team games, everyone was pretty much exhausted so it was very inviting to sing Happy Birthday to WPIPS and enjoy a piece of delicious birthday cake (thanks Pat), despite the bird footprints (full story on that later). Presentations and speeches were made after we sang the school song and everyone took home a medal and certificate plus spectators and helpers were not left out because there was even an award from the person who cheered the most - Caro! And a small present was also given to each family who've helped throughout the year... and then it was time to pack up again! I suppose I should also mention the winning team?? Well, that was very close and Lilac ended up taking home the 1st place title after being in 3rd place before the team games. Gold also did exceptionally well and were in 1st place most of the way, and as for Pearl- their performance was too commendable, in fact, I think everyone were winners! And the most important thing, isn't the fact that a particular team lost or won, but that we all had lots of fun! Here are just some pictures, more pictures and info coming soon, so watch this space!

 Division 2 Long Jump, in 1st place (from Gold)... Brendon Gooding, 2nd (from Pearl)... Hugh Telfer, and Georgia Kelly (also from Pearl) took home 3rd place.

 This is the lovely birthday cake made by Pat, after someone turned their back for just a few seconds and the magpies made the most of the delightful treat and decided to leave their mark (perfect footprints, you think?) Another corner was slightly nibbled too...

 The Beanbag Throw!

Our fantastic helpers, Roger and Michelle. Michelle was chief recorder for the day and Roger was in charge of various different jobs including timing, measuring, raking and holding the ribbon for competitors to run through at the end of the race, not to mention, first aid volunteer. Fortunately, he was only needed once with a bee sting.

(Lots) more info and photos coming soon...

Project Bunting

With preparations for our sports carnival in full swing, we've set to work making some pretty bunting in the colours of our 3 factions - gold, pearl and lilac.
Here we have a tutorial on how to make some bunting. You don't have to use your bunting for a carnival, it would look great as decoration inside a house or wherever you choose!

Step 1 - Collect the materials!

You will need: thin carboard (we used cereal boxes), stickytape, a ruler, a pencil, gluestick, scissors, string and coloured/patterned paper (square is best).

Step 2 - Cut out the triangles

If your paper is already square, that's great, but if not cut it to a square shape and then fold it in half so that the back of the paper is facing outwards. You will then need to draw lines like the ones above. Our paper was 30cm squared and we drew lines at 0cm, 10cm, 20cm and 30cm on the top and at 5cm, 15cm and 25cm on the bottom. Once you've drawn the lines (remember to use a ruler and a pencil in case you make a mistake) cut out the triangles.

Step 3 - Glue the triangles onto cardboard

This is a pretty simple step, but remember to glue the back of the triangles to the patterned side of the cardboard so that then the backs of the triangles look nice and neat! Another handy tip is to glue the triangles nice and close together so that not so much cardboard is wasted.

Step 4 - Cut the triangles out of cardboard

Step 5 - String the triangles

Above is what our triangles looked like before they were hung. To make the hanging process easier, we taped a piece of string from one side of the room to the other (a bit like a washing line) and then stickytaped the triangles onto the string. It doesn't matter if the backs look a bit bad, the front should be that striking that no-one is going to worry about the back and if the bunting is hung on a wall, you're not going to see it anyhow. If you wanted, you could put 2 triangles back to back.

The finished product will be revealed tomorrow, so watch this space!