Autumn leaves, a country setting and lockdown learning innovation: KZN Midlands schools
The Meander Chronicle has been keeping tabs on what some of the Midlands’ schools have been up to during lockdown.
During Covid-19’s national lockdown Wembley College’s Facebook page is one of those that has been full of photos and videos sent by pupils and members of the broader school community expressing their support for the school in Greytown. The caption to this cute picture, top, (taken pre-lockdown), posted in the past week, says it all: “A school in the country!”
Missing their pals
Many of the schoolkids are desperately missing school and their pals. On day 47 of lockdown, St Charles College in Pietermaritzburg received this special request made to the president from one of its Grade 3 boys, Ruben Fryer.
Howick High School’s Grade 9 pupils have been creating the most awesome masks, left, as their learning task during the coronavirus lockdown. The school is looking forward to seeing more of their wonderful masks soon.
The Grade 1s and 2s at Epworth School (see pic below) had a wonderful time creating puppets out of paper! Some of them created folded origami items and others made little paper puppets with their fingers as the puppets’ legs. The cute pics were posted to the school’s Facebook page.
Hilton College confirmed that the Hilton Arts Festival, hosted annually at the school, has been cancelled for 2020 due to the coronavirus crisis.
“It is with great sadness that we announce the cancellation of #HiltonArtsFest 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Our team is working hard to try to put together a very special virtual celebration for all our fans and lovers of the arts, so keep your eyes peeled for more information on that! Please click on to read our full statement.”
This stunning Autumn picture was posted on the Michaelhouse Facebook page. A worthy reminder to the pupils and school community of how beautiful their school is at this time of year.
The culture of giving
St Charles College Grade 10 pupil Shayur Maharaj and Aditi Maharaj, a Grade 4 pupil at The Wykeham Collegiate, are the youngest donors to date (at the time of publishing) to have contributed to the PMB Community Chest’s 60th Anniversary Pledge.
The Pietermaritzburg and District Community Chest will celebrate its 60th anniversary on August 3, for which preparations have been disrupted by Covid-19. All the more reason to thank the Maharaj family – parents Vanuja and Sanjeev – for introducing their children to the culture of reaching out to those who are less privileged.
The children’s donation was funded by household chores they’ve carried out since the beginning of this year. (Info via Pietermaritzburg & Midlands Chamber of Business)
On a recent Saturday evening, the Treverton School community took part in a “Trevi Night Run”, with the challenge on to run (or walk) as far as possible in home gardens, between the hours of 6 and 9pm.
The start time for the challengers was flexible, but the gauntlet was laid down to challenge others, sponsor laps and raise as much money as possible to support the “Masking Mooi River Initiative”.
This initiative is raising funds to buy face masks for those in the Mooi River community who cannot afford them.
The school said it was extremely proud of all who took part. One Johannesburg grandmother didn’t allow the limitations of a flat stop her from participating, and opted for planking in-house, while others added challenges to their laps such as an egg and spoon lap, dress-up, three legged, and sack race laps.
Great fun was had by all, and for a very worthy cause!
Drakensberg Boys Choir took part in a virtual choral celebration.
This afternoon we took part in the Virtual Choral Celebration Festival – what a great initiative to lift spirits and to share the special magic of choirs across South Africa.
For the full Festival, please watch here https://t.co/qnyXVPasIy pic.twitter.com/10rmItYwxn
— Drakensberg Boys Choir (@DBChoir) May 17, 2020