ESTEVAN - Pleasantdale School celebrated the last days of winter with a Festival du Voyageur last week.
On March 15, students gathered outside for a school-wide fun event. Ten outdoor stations offered a variety of exciting activities that allowed students to have a great time and also learn about voyageurs.
"We had a committee of teachers, and we used our student leadership team. They helped us out with getting the events ready and with running the events," said school principal Michelle Smart.
"We learned a little bit about being a voyageur and we called it the Festival du Voyageur because we were trying to build in some French culture into our building now that we're offering French Immersion.”
Students were working in their buddy groups going through different outdoor stations. There was an igloo made out of the school's dome-shaped climbing structure, and inside one of the teachers who turned into a storyteller was showing some artifacts and sharing stories about them.
There was a snow sculpture creation station. They had a high-kick station, where there was a ball tied on the rope and kids had to jump up and kick it with one foot. They also could partake in the toboggan race, where older students pulled younger ones. There was a pin the tail on the caribou station and a maple syrup toffee-making station. Kids also tried out snowshoeing, played the snow snake game and did a portage.
"We had voyager sashes for the kids. And then they loaded tubs of snow, we just use the snow for weight … and had relay teams, moving them from one side of the designated area to the other like they were portaging," Smart explained.
The event started with a school-wide tug of war and ended with hot chocolate served by the School Community Council, which also helped with maple toffee making.
Smart said that the dates for the festival were changed a few times due to the weather, but after all, it turned out to be a great event.
"It was a fun, wonderful day, a little bit of rain, but it didn't rain very long," Smart said. "We hadn't been together for so long and that was the whole school event. It was too bad we couldn't have our parents there. But we had it planned and ready and decided we would do that the next time."
Smart added that their new French Immersion program introduced this school year is going well, and they are currently taking registrations for the next year.
