Circus Week

All Obersee Bilingual School teachers and students have been looking forward to Circus Project Week and now it has finally started! Planning that began back in September when OBS staff met with representatives of Circus Balloni involved everything from getting permission to set up the tent to making sure students were involved early in the process.

Circus Workshop

A few weeks ago, a workshop was held in which all the children got a chance to see and try out a few of the different circus activities – “strong humans”, “Juggler”, “Acrobat”, “Magician” and even “Wild Animals”. Combining children through all levels of the school, groups were created and production plans were put into place.

Tent Setup

Supportive and helpful parents ready to lend a hand and try something new came together with students and teachers on Sunday to put up the tent. Luckily, the sun was shining and everything was put into place quickly. The circus representative said that our OBS team was one of the fastest they had on record for getting a circus tent assembled! Everyone present felt the fun team atmosphere created by pulling together to do something new and useful.

Monday

On Monday, in spite of the rain, happy children filled the tent and everyone got into the circus spirit together laughing and clapping at the clown’s antics. Interspersed with snack, lunch and time outside to play, each group is spending their time in their preparation rooms putting together their act for Friday. Already, children can be seen walking around school with stars painted on their foreheads or heard saying “wow, it’s great fun with the strong humans group”.

Tuesday

As Circus Week continues to the second day with another fun warm-up in the tent, children are trying out their tricks and acts, making signs and posters, choosing costumes from a wide array provided by the circus Balloni, trying on their own hand-made costumes and sharing lots of laughs. The circus representatives visited each group to give them hints and advice and to help them shape their performances.

Wednesday

The third day of circus week began with children excitedly telling each other about their afternoon activities from the day before – some groups went to practice their magic in the forest, another went to see real “wild animals” at the kinderzoo, another group visited a fitness center to see real “strong men”, some groups enjoyed an afternoon of grilling and group practice in the forest play park, and another group went to the fire station, rode fire truck ladders up high into the air and got to ride back to school on the fire truck. Today, everyone joined together in the circus tent for more laughter and fun and now each group is continuing to refine their program with support from the circus staff.

Thursday

After the fun warm-up in the circus tent, the fourth day of Circus Week began with a clear increase in feelings of anticipation and excitement! Energy levels are high, children are practicing hard and the smell of popcorn is in the air. Children who previous to this week hardly knew each other are seen walking around hand-in-hand during break times. Pepe, the Circus Balloni program coach, commented that in the 200 shows he has done at schools, he has never seen a group of children who are so bright-eyed, happy, enthusiastic and well-behaved as OBS students are. A report from Andrea in the kitchen: lunch-time meat consumption has gone up by 14 kilos per day!

Friday

The culminating day of Circus Week opened with busy excitement as all prekindergarten, kindergarten and primary children prepared for the big dress rehearsal. Fully costumed, eager and cooperative children worked along with their OBS Team group leader to make sure everyone was in the right place at the right time. Each group had the chance to show off their act as the children performed for each other in preparation for the first public show at 14:00. Everyone had a break and a satisfying lunch with the kitchen staff showing the exceptional ability to make sure children distributed throughout all the OBS rooms each received what they needed.

Parents began arriving at 13:30 where the backstage group greeted them with bubbles and popcorn. The performance began with groups of sweetly dressed prekindergarten children dancing to great music, and continued with acrobats, magicians, wild animals, Fakir, strong humans, trapeze artist, slapstick fancy ladder-work and clowns. Children and teachers were thrilled with what they had accomplished as a team, and parents were surprised and impressed with the results. Most children went home for the rest of the afternoon, but some stayed on to play and to enjoy another nice meal prepared by the kitchen staff, getting ready for another performance. A group of OBS Team members enjoying each other’s company at a local restaurant were surprised when an anonymous OBS parent paid their whole bill. Thanks very much!

The evening started as children and parents began to arrive at 18:00. The evening performance was filled with an air of excitement as the older children got to show off their accomplishments to their parents for the first time (having been keeping careful secrets all week!). It was amazing to see the team-work, trust and confidence that the children displayed. Parents said they really appreciated the show and generously responded to the charitable collection for The Theodora Foundation (bringing clowns into hospitals to visit children), which all proceeds of ticket and popcorn sales will also benefit. The children and OBS Team really enjoyed the week of challenges and trust-building fun as well as the chance to contribute charitably to the well-being of children who very much need some laughter in their lives.

Tent Takedown

The rain, thankfully, limited itself to only the nighttime hours and, although wet, the tent came down quickly with the help of about 25 parents, teachers and children. Although the work was sometimes demanding, everyone had smiles on their faces (a few had heard about the blistered hands of parents who put up the tent, and brought their own gloves) and enjoyed working together.

OBS is incredibly thankful to the OBS team members who planned for months and worked extra hard this week, and to the children with their open hearts and eager minds willing to go to new levels of mutual trust and confidence, and to the parents who made it all possible by putting up and taking down the tent, and supporting their children and the school.