On 8th June 2022, St. Mary's School, Tristan da Cunha celebrated an amazing and wonderful World Ocean Day. The day was filled with many fun activities which the children all enjoyed and a presentation was given, based on the Marine Protection Zone around Tristan da Cunha, which was very interesting, hosted by Janine and Jess, from the MPZ department. All of the children from the eldest ones in Creche up to the eldest in Class 5 were all engaged with the whole event.
All of the classes' timetables were put on hold for the day, so that all of the children could take part. Everyone spent the day having fun, they enjoyed talking and drawing about our beautiful ocean.

Ocean themed school assembly
We first had an Ocean themed assembly where Miss Donna did a talk about the ocean and asked the whole school questions about World Ocean Day. This continued with Classes 3, 4 and 5 reading poems about the ocean.
Drawing underwater scenes
Afterwards, the whole school, including Makayla and Noah (eldest in the creche) joined in with the drawing of underwater ocean scenes.
Baby shark song
Makayla and Noah, Playgroup and Classes 1-3 also took part in the Baby Shark song with actions on the stage. This was delightful to watch
Hook a fish, shark fin hoopla and pin the tail on the whale
Other games and activities included Hooking the Five Fingers, the children were timed to see how many fish they could hook up within a specified time limit.
The children also got into groups, using eco bricks making sculptures. Hoops were thrown onto a model shark's fin and the pupils were also put into two teams to see if they could pin the correct tail on the whale.
Learning about the local whales
This final activity was particularly educational as the children also learnt interesting facts about four types of whales which are found living within the ocean around Tristan.
After the games, winners were given prizes and everyone were presented with MPZ stickers from Jess.
Feedback from the children
The following day, the children were asked in class about what they had enjoyed most, and learnt about taking part in World Ocean Day. Most responses included that the conservation and preservation of all marine life around the Tristan da Cunha island group is very, very important.
St. Mary's School pupils are all very passionate and considerate about the marine life found in our ocean around the islands. We all concluded that we must help to protect, conserve and preserve the marine life for the future generations to come.