Week of Flags and Costume.
Books and libraries/h1>

Every year in mid-October, one of the most vibrant and long-awaited events in the life of our school takes place — The Week of National Flags and Costumes. And, every year, it is completely special and has a unique theme.

This year, the theme of the week was timed to coincide with the general theme of the year — “Books are a source of knowledge”. The slogan reminded, and to this day reminds us of the fruits that this very knowledge produces in practice: “Today a reader, tomorrow a leader.” Over the course of the week, children learned about the history of writing, the creation of books, and our national libraries.

Each Learning Center studied a specific historical stage in the development of writing and developed its own project, which was eventually presented to other Learning Centers.
In addition to team work, each student worked on an individual mini project — to create their own book. This way, first grade students studied and practiced writing on papyrus, and then each made a book from this material. In the third grade, as part of the study of writing on stones — cuneiform, students collaborated to reproduce the Ten Commandments on tablets, and subsequently each created a book using stones. Fourth grade students made their own parchment from sheep’s skin and each created their own book from leather, using a pen and ink to write. As part of their research, high school students went on an educational journey into the “Gutenberg universe” — the first multimedia center in the Russian library space on the history of books and bookmaking, dedicated to the role and significance of books in the life of mankind, in the development of culture, science and education for almost 600 year history of printing. As part of the exhibition, high school students got acquainted with a model of a 15th century printing house, looked at illustrated samples of military and scientific books, personal libraries and bookplates in the collection of rare books of the Library of Foreign Literature, and much more.

In addition to studying the process of creating the books themselves, all school students were given the opportunity to plunge into history even deeper and study the emergence of the materials themselves, which were used as ancient carriers of writing. For example, students who studied writing on stones, as part of a school laboratory, immersed themselves in the history of magma, lava and volcanoes, thanks to which even the youngest students of the school learned how and where stones came from.

All students, without exception, were imbued with the historical atmosphere, were passionate about studying the appearance of books and became familiar with the ancient process of their creation on unusual media.

An integral part of National Flag and Costume Week is Chapel. This week, according to tradition, there are two chapels — the first is the opening ceremony of the week, the second is summing up and sharing impressions. Through a theatrical performance, we were reminded that we must take care of our books, because as we learned from scripture, “The property of a diligent man is of great value.” (Proverbs 12:27)

Of course, there was also a traditional parade of flags.

And on Friday, everyone brought national dishes of their country to share with their neighbors. This is one of the moments long-awaited by everyone, because it is a unique opportunity to try dishes from different countries of the world in their best home-made execution.

What a wonderful Week of National Flags and Costumes we had this year! We are already looking forward to the next one!