A number of our kindergartens recently participated in a red and white dress up day to show their support for Tonga. A big thank you to all whānau and tamariki who brought along a gold coin donation to raise funds.

Below, two of our kindergartens have shared what they did in their kindergartens to raise awareness about Tonga:

“One of the children came up to me asking me to look at two pieces of paper they had cut up and written on. One had $100 written in felt pen and the other had letters written in red on it. He explained to me that he had made $100 to go on the Tongan flag tomorrow and the other note reminded him to wear red and white.

A couple of other children sat with me close to the Tongan flag and realised that they didn’t have any clothes that look like the flag but they did have red and white clothes they could wear. It was also interesting to see that many children followed the news and knew about the disaster in Tonga and how our navy ships had gone to help.

We raised just over $100.”

– Ponsonby Kindergarten

“We wore red (some children forgot) and the children made so many money collecting buckets – it started with just decorating one … the next minute we had about 5 on the go. We raised $85 in total. Our Teacher Aide Rae is a drummer and she bought in a few of her Pasifika drums for a big music session. We made cultural prints and talked a lot during the days prior about why we were raising money for our friends in Tonga. The children all understood what happened with the volcano as this is a big interest in the sandpit, and we also talked about the huge wave that swept through the villages.”

– Whenuapai Kindergarten