Monday 19 December 2011

Christmas Concert and Prizegiving Ceremony 2011

Last night was the night of our second annual... Christmas Concert and Prizegiving Ceremony 2011! Once again, the concert was held at WPIPS and we had many budding actors and actresses set to impress! We started the evening as normal before the came across a (planned) dilemma! None of the costumes were right! Some had been ruined and no one had any idea why! So instead of our "original performance" we had to watch a bit of TV (at least while we were trying to solve the dilemma). The TV programs were good though, they had a Christmas around the World theme and covered Mexico, France, England, India, Australia and Hollywood! Plus they were in 3D so that made it even better! 

Alivia wearing her 3D glasses


Kerrie looked stunning in her 3D glasses
Georgie loved her 3D glasses

And the Mexican cake!
Yohan found the "Jesus" figurine!
 


The Mexican dancing was great fun!
Then just at the end of the Mexican program, someone must have changed the channel (no idea who, but something tells me it was Brooke, because the remote was found under his chair) seeing as instead of the programmed French channel, an R-rated program turned on! Thankfully we found the remote just in time!
"The following program is classified R-rated, and contains strong violence, sexual scenes and coarse language"


In France, they chopped down and decorated a Christmas Tree (sapin de Noel)
 


And in England, the audience was treated to an interview with the Queen and Kate Middleton
For a while it all went OK, until someone (still no idea who!) unplugged the TV! Luckily, it was just the right time for a break so the audience took the chance to look around the Discovery Room whilst we fixed the TV.
In the Discovery Room during the break


Or for those who had already checked out the Discovery Room, Hugh and Santa (Jesse) gave an amusing show.
And just as we thought nothing else would happen, something went wrong with the 3D and while the 3D characters tried to interact with the audience, it didn't work and the TV screen smashed! I hope no one got too injured in the process. This latest dilemma meant no TV either to it was a good thing that we managed to get at least one part of our original performance ready. So we all sang "It's A Small World" before awarding the Prince & Princess Book Awards. This years recipients, Amelia and Hugh, really deserved the prizes. Then each staff member and student took the audience back to one of their most memorable parts of the year. A BBQ was a well deserved treat at the end!


Three beautiful Indian dancers
Singing "It's A Small World"

Hollywood Chat Session with Abby and Jo
We never found out who was fiddling around and causing all the dilemmas, but we did catch this elf sneaking past!

Wednesday 14 December 2011

Judaism - Potato Latkes

In Room 3 lately, we've been learning about different religions around the world and the festivals they celebrate. We learnt all about Hanukkah, celebrated by Jewish people during late November/ early December each year. First we did a lot of learning and then we made dreidels and played a game with some friends! Then we learnt about the foods eaten at Hanukkah. They include oil to symbolise the miracle that the oil kept the lamps lit for 8 days. And then we made potato latkes!!!!
You can get the recipe for potato latkes here (or you can follow our tutorial)

First, you will need all these ingredients: 1.5kg of potatoes,  2 medium onions (we left them out), 2 eggs, 2 teaspoons of salt, 1/2 teaspoon of pepper (we left that out too), 4 tablespoons of flour, 1 teaspoon of baking powder and some vegetable oil for frying.
Start by grating the potatoes and then place them in a strainer and try to get rid of as much moisture as possible
Add all the other ingredients and mix!
This is what the mixture should look like once all the ingredients have been added
Place 2-3 tablespoons of mixture onto the pan for each latke. Flatten them out and let them cook for about 4-5 minutes per side
Yum! Once the latkes have been fried, place them on some paper towel so that the oil can drain...and enjoy!

We didn't have enough time to make some apple sauce but apparently the two go well together (you can find the recipe on the same link as the potato latkes if you're interested). If you have been inspired and do get cooking this holiday, we'd love to know how your potato latkes turned out because ours were delicious!