Culture Day

Last Thursday was my last day of school at Riverside and also happened to be culture day. Every classroom picked a country to learn about/display to other classrooms and I ended up helping the Year 2 class as they decided to do Canada. I actually don't usually go to school on Thursday's as that is not my day to work but I could not pass up the opportunity to help out representing my country. So I brought in as many Canadian t-shirts as I could, along with a picture book about Canada. I also made a ton of maple cookies for the year 2 and year 1 classes so they could try eating something Canadian. Then I made butter tarts for the year 2 class that learned about Canada. I have never made butter tarts before and they actually turned out really well, but were not that easy to make so I now have an even greater appreciation for those who go through the slow processes of making them.

I then brought in my hockey equipment to show the kids how you would get dressed for a game and what it looks like. Now if we were in a Canadian school this would be ridiculous of course as I'm sure over 50% of the kids would actually be playing the sport. But in an international school in Prague this was actually a good idea. The kids really enjoyed watching me quickly put on half of my equipment along with letting the kids try on my helmet. The year 1 kids just stared at me in amazement and didn’t say much. One kid told me I looked like a super hero, another a giant. I asked one class what they thought you called my shoulder pads and someone shouted out they were called a shield...ah not quite...but close.

Then in the afternoon the older kids put on kind of a fair for all the students with the country that they represented. So they had some games pertaining to their country along with food that you could buy. It was fantastic to say the least because the school has so many kids from different cultures, and of course the mom’s went to town on the food. For the Spanish pavilion we had a whole tapas bar, sushi for the Japanese one and hummus with the Jordanian. The kids had a blast the whole day and really enjoyed learning (and eating) about other cultures, especially when the school is very multicultural.

The staff actually had a send off for me which I was quite surprised by and gave me a sweet card along with a couple of pictures of Prague and some bath products from here. It was really sweet as I did not expect anything. I will truly miss the school and of course all the teachers there. I can honestly say that Riverside is a school unlike none other I’ve been to before. The teachers are all extremely hard working and genuinely nice people. I’ll miss them for sure, and of course my students that I worked with. It was a great experience for me as I have never worked with kids with special needs before outside of the gym. Most of the kids just needed a bit of extra support in one subject area or another, and hopefully they actually got something out of our sessions. Not to mention I taught swimming and never in my life would I have ever thought that would happen. Actually if you were to tell me ten years ago or even five that I would be teaching swimming lessons in Prague, I would have laughed in your face. But nope it’s true, I did that and made it through and actually enjoyed it...most days!

So now I’m off for the next couple of weeks until the season is over which I am fine with. It will be nice to spend some days at home planning my trip with my mom for March/April along with being able to get out and see the rest of Prague and the things I haven’t gotten around to yet.


Kids working on making Canadian flags.


Me with a student in my attempt to "quickly" get dressed.


The little guy with my helmet on.