This year we celebrated Anzac Day a bit

differently. Usually we make posies for the

school children to lay at the War Memorial by

the RSA.

We were unable to get them there this time, so

we tried a new idea, which turned out to be

amazing.

It all began Tuesday afternoon when a re-

source pack arrived in the post from the MOE

talking about setting up a small Field of

Remembrance. With the

pack were some small

crosses that we could make,

and photos of people who had

been in the war.

Fields of Remembrance for Early Childhood Centres

The Fields of Remembrance Trust and the Ministry of Education have formed a partnership to support all early learning services in commemorating the sacrifice of our veterans during World War 1 (WW1). Across the country early learning centres (Kindergartens, Playcentres, Kōhanga reo, and Day-care centres) will be sent a WW1 Commemoration Package, including three small white crosses to com-memorate the men and women who died serving New Zealand during WW1. The commemoration packages aim to inform and inspire younger generations. Activities: Tell their Stories :

9/523 SGT. R.C. TRAVIS VC, DM, MM, CdG 22/125 S/NURSE N.M. HILDYARD

10/127 2/LT. T.M.P. GRACE MID

Invite a soldier or an old soldier to visit - contact your nearest RSA or DEFENCE Base.

Visit a WW1 Memorial near you.

Contact a school near you for information on their WW1 ceremonies.

Visit Museums to view their WW1 exhibitions.

Make thumb-print poppies with paint.

Bake ANZAC biscuits.

Make medals and talk about how and why people get medals.

talk to families and whanau - do they have stories?

Phyllis said this was great, but did not know

how we could build a Field of Remembrance in

3 days.

Rachel smiled and said, 'What about our new

garden that the teachers made with the

children?’

It was agreed

On Wednesday afternoon we made some

crosses of our own as part of our Bible time.

Realising it would be a good learning

experience we took the children down to the com-

puter room for them to choose and print out

their own photos of the people who went to war to

look after us.

The children came back with shiny eyes and

proudly holding the photographs they

had chosen to put on their crosses.

As we had some wood that was just the right

size we decided to use it to make our individual

crosses. Phyllis started making the crosses.

Bella was a great help with her creative use of

cellotape.

What fun we all had gluing the photos the chil-

dren had chosen on to the crosses, ready for our

Remembrance Walk on Friday.

Earlier in the week we made a request for

flowers to make posies. Our parents were very

kind and helped us with this. The children loved

making the posies and some made two, one for

the Kindy garden and one for their family.

Thursday afternoon came and Kindy invited

Carolyn, and Lauren, from Pioneers to come

with, Brooklyn, Mykah, Lily and Manaia to

join us. Phyllis talked to the children about

where we were going and thanked everyone for

taking part.

Rachel composed a cool song for the occasion

which she sang as we gathered at the garden.

‘Anzac Day, Anzac Day, Its our special time to

pray, For the men and women

who fought the war, Special hugs and prayers for sure.’

Phyllis and Rachel handed out the crosses and

posies that the children had made. We all got to

hold something.

When we got there the children took turns

Waiting patiently while each child put their

gifts in the garden.

The teachers said later on, how very respectful,

interested and kind the Kindergarten children

and Pioneers children had been.

Later in the afternoon when the

parents came to pick up their children,

they took them round to proudly show

them where they had put the crosses and posies.

Thank you to the Fields of Remembrance

Trust and Ministry of Education for

partnering together to provide this amazing

recourse to focus on ECE Services and

Kohanga Reo. It was just right for our

pre-school age group.

We wanted to send you a copy of our book to

say thank you. What a great experience

for our children.