The Savannah Chinese Heritage Group donated 36 bilingual Chinese-English books to Savannah-Chatham County Public Schools. The book donation is aimed at benefiting both English-language learning families and the broader general education population.
"Our primary goal in providing these books is to encourage a deeper understanding among the diverse residents of our community. Through this modest yet meaningful donation, we earnestly hope to spark a lifelong journey of learning and contribute to the promotion of racial harmony within our community," said Xunhua Mo, a member of the organization.
The day began with a cooking lesson. The group gave a lesson in making Mooncakes, a traditional Chinese delicacy that is enjoyed during the Mid-Autumn Festival. The Mid-Autumn Festival, also known as the Moon Festival, is a traditional festival celebrated in Chinese and Asian culture. Similar holidays are celebrated in Japan (Tsukimi), Korea (Chuseok), Vietnam (Tết Trung Thu), and other countries in East and Southeast Asia. It is one of the most popular holidays in Chinese culture, dating back over 3,000 years.
"I am so excited that our school district has connected with the generous members of the Chinese Heritage Group. Our Savannah area has a beautiful array of families with diverse cultures and languages that we enthusiastically welcome into the learning experience," said Mrs. Rebekah Hein, Innovative Approaches to Literacy Teacher Specialist for All Aboard the Reading Express. "Our top languages other than English in the district are Spanish, Arabic, Farsi, Dari, Pashto, Vietnamese and of course, Chinese. May Howard’s ESOL program alone represents over 17 different languages across the globe. Since its inception in 2022, All Aboard the Reading Express has filled our Savannah community with over 13,000 multicultural & multilingual books from birth to 12th grade in an effort to leverage book access for our families of various backgrounds & languages. Meaningful literacy & the love of learning from home to school are ignited in moments like these ones: where what we are reading is connected to what we are doing and the friends we make along the way."
After making Mooncakes, the students moved to the Media Center to hear a bilingual book. Mrs. Rebekah Hein, IAL Teacher Specialist, and Yan Chen Rhea, a College Board Guest Teacher at Southwest Middle School for three years, read a book about the Chinese Zodiac New Year animals.
Finally, the Mooncakes were ready! All the students enjoyed tasting the sweet cakes!
See more photos from the celebration
here.
