Students Show How It’s Done
Year 12 students of International School in Suva are taking part in traditional mat weaving project as they prepare to celebrate the school’s 50th Anniversary in July.
School teacher and project coordinator, Tanya Ulacake, said the mat known as the i-coco will be the students’ gift to the school during the upcoming anniversary celebrations.
“We want to give back something we Fijians hold dearly in our tradition and that is a mat,” Ms Ulacake said.
“We noticed that when we host traditional functions we are always without a school mat, we would usually borrow from outside so this is something that we thought our seniors could work on with an expert weaver and using our creativity programme we teach these young ones this skill of weaving,” she said.
She said students only work on the mat on Wednesdays and yesterday was the fifth week.
“We have four rotations of Year 12 students, so one group does it in a week and the other does it the week after,” Ms Ulacake said.
“By now all four rotations have worked on the mat and we’ve started the rotation again.
“I tell students that to be part of the weaving is like their mana to the school, so when they go and come back they can see the mat still being used by the school. “There are 36 students in Year 12 and they are working on this.”
Students enjoy the work
She added students loved the experience.
“The boys enjoy it and they are focused on weaving. They are students from different parts of the world and they will take this knowledge back with them when they return to their different countries and of course practise it on whatever they can to weave,” Ms Ulacake said.
“Later we will open it up for the students of school in semester two where we can learn how to do place mats and other handicrafts.” A total of 56 nationalities are represented in the school.
Expert weaver
Venisita Lowchee, 28, has been leading the students in the art.
Ms Lowchee was specially brought in by the school to assist in the project.
“It has been a joy to teach the students,” she said.
“Seeing them enjoy the art of weaving has been overwhelming. “It was hard at first when we had to begin but to see them put in their concentration and all into weaving and that the mat is nearly complete, it has been a joy.”
She said the students will be able to complete the project next Wednesday.