Yesterday the children and staff at Rangi Ruru Preschool worked together to make a Korowai, a feather cloak, as part of our celebration of Matariki – the Maori New Year.

At circle time we all coloured paper feather in beautiful colours – every feather looked different from all the others. The sharing of resources was amazing, with so many requests to “please swap colours” or “Could I borrow that after you.”

Each feather was laminated, cut out and attached to our fabric.  We were testing out how a cloak would look and next week we will start screen printing and painting fabric feathers (in the school art department), for a more permanent Korowai to link our children and families together and keep as a taonga or treasure for the preschool.

We wanted to show off our hard work and Freddie quickly offered to wear the cloak out in the big school.  We visited Dr Hastie’s Office (the school Principal) to see her real feather Korowai that was gifted to Rangi Ruru Girl’s School. We showed our cloak off around the school, and gained huge smiles from everyone we passed.

Thanks to Jonti’s Mum, Libby, for all your enthusiam.  We can’t wait to start working with you on our fabric Korowai – We love our time in the art studios!