May 28, 2016
Flying Peace from Nakateshima Elementary
School in Osaka, Japan
The sixth grade students learned a lot about war and peace, hearing a
story of war from an old person who had an actual experience of war and visiting
Hiroshima as their school excursion. They realized that they were living in a
very peaceful world which they took a granted while many people were suffering
from conflicts in some places of this world.
Last September, each of them made her/his own poster on peace and
wrote an essay about her/his wish for peace. In October, they went to Hiroshima
and visited many historical places related to the tragedy of atomic bombing. In
December, they started making their Kids’ Guernica peace painting. First, they
decided to put the main idea of seven representative students in the center of
the canvas and surround it with each student’s peace poster. The painting
expresses their seven wishes for peace.
Their school symbol mark shows their school’s commitment to creating
a peaceful world. A rainbow as a way to peace. An uncomplete puzzle of world
map and letters of “PEACE” is a wish to bring peace into this world which is
not yet peaceful. Various pigeons trying to place some pieces of puzzle show cooperation
for building a happy world. People with their arms on each other’s shoulders also
represent a necessity of cooperation of all the people in the world. A phoenix with
a world map is a symbol of permanent peace. As the last seventh message, peace
posters created by all the sixth grade students and pigeons express there are
various ideas of peace and the importance of working together.
Finally, each of their wishes for peace became one in their
wonderful bright picture. They could have a good opportunity to unite all of
them and share their wishes for peace through this project.
