Year 5 Residential!

So one of the cool things about Brenna's school here in Penang is that they take each class from Year 3 (2nd grade in US terms) and up on a "residential" or overnight trip to start teaching the kids independence and inspire a love of learning through travel and new experiences.  Year 3's go for 1 night; Year 4's go for 2 days and Year 5's go for 3 nights, with each year's destination just a little farther from home.  Year 6's actually take a 5 night trip to Sarawak, which involves a 2.5 hour flight to the island of Borneo.  It's quite an experience for the kids and something not done in the American school system, so also new for us US parents.

Brenna's trip this year involved a bus ride to the Cameron Highlands, with a stop on the way in Ipoh for some caving at the Gua Tempurung Caves.  The caves are spectacular, with stalactites and stalagmites everywhere.  The walk required wading through the underground river as there has been a lot of rain recently and then some crawling through small openings to get to the larger chambers.  The kids (and the parent volunteers) LOVED it!  Wet clothes, helmets and head lamps were transported back to school by the parent volunteers while the kids went on to Tanah Rata.  I could tell from how wet her clothes were that she had a great time there.  Here's a photo of the caves...

In the Cameron Highlands, the kids visited a weather station and learned about the climate (it's cooler in the mountains of the Highlands), saw the weather instruments and learned how the weather station sends information to all the news outlets.  They visited the Boh tea plantation and saw how the tea is made, after which they were treated to a tea tasting!  They also visited the Rose Center where they completed an "Amazing Race" activity with some tricky clues.  They went on a hill trek, picked fresh strawberries and shopped in the local market for ingredients for a cooking challenge...Brenna's favorite event.  Her group created the "fruit overflow" with oranges, limes, strawberries, a "weird purple apple thing", honey and a lollipop.  Sounds delicious, but they were outdone by the "plate of heaven" created by another group.  In the evenings they went swimming and did some sketching and drawing.  So while Brenna had been to the Highlands with us in the spring, it was a great trip and Brenna loved staying in a hotel room with her friends.

We were thrilled to get her back on Friday afternoon tired, but in one piece (although she did manage to slice her finger with a knife during the cooking challenge), with most of her stuff (had to make a trip to the school on Saturday to retrieve her bag which had been left behind at pickup) and with lots of good memories!

Tea plantations of Cameron Highlands