On June 8th, the school had a Japan Day with visitors from Aquatera who taught about Japanese culture. Students saw Japanese artifacts, tried sushi and kimonos. They were split into groups for activities like origami, composing music, and testing hydrogen with a pop sound or making robots. Presentations were given about Japan and Aquatera's renewable energy research in the sea. The document provides details about the various activities the students participated in to learn about Japanese culture.

1. Japan Day
On Thursday 8th
of June we had our Japan day at school.
We had some visitors come out to Stronsay and teach us about japan. They were both worked for
Aquatera. Aquatera is a company that researches renewable energy for example finding out how
it affects the animals .Their names were Jen and Yuka. Yuka was from Japan and Jen was from
Dublin.
In the Morning we had an assembly and we wondered around looking at lots of
different artefacts from Japan. Some of us tried sushi and some didn’t. We got to
try a kimono on if we wanted to.
We got spilt into 3 different groups with each group containing Primary 1 to
Secondary 3.
There were 3 different activities. There was a crafting activity where you went to
the primary room and you could paint, do calligraphy, do finger painting on a big cherry blossom
tree which is very special in Japan, haikus, origami and drawing.
Another one of the activities was Composing Japanese music. You got told what notes you could use
then you got partnered up and you went to a keyboard and started composing. Once you had
finished the second line you took it to the music teacher and they played it on the piano.
One of the activities was testing hydrogen but the younger ones went and made robots out of junk
that other had been collected. When we were making hydrogen you got put into partners and the
teacher told us what to do. We filled a tub up with water (not all the way to the top) and put the test
tubes in the water but we had to make sure there were no bubbles in the test tubes. We put
magnesium ribbon into a conical flask and used a thistle funnel to pour the hydrochloric acid into the
conical flask (the thistle funnel is a good funnel because it is made for safe pouring) then hydrogen (a
gas) was pushed through a delivery tube and went into the test tubes. Once the hydrogen was in the
tubes we held them upside down and put a bung in them. Once all of the test tubes were filled up
we went over to the Bunsen burners and used a splint and took the bung off of the test tubes (one
at a time) and put the splint that was on fire (just a bit at the top) inside the test tube where we
heard a pop which meant there was hydrogen in it. If there was no hydrogen and just oxygen it the
tube there was no noise. Then once we had finished testing for hydrogen we got shown a little
Hydrogen car.
The other activity was a presentation. Jen and Yuka had prepared separate Presentations. Yuka did a
presentation about Japan and Jen did a presentation about Aquatera. Jen told us about the different
renewable machines they use in the sea and what they are planning on doing. Yuka told us about

2. some important traditions in japan. She showed us what a Japan house looked like and the inside.
We even got to learn a little bit of Japan.
I really enjoyed the Japan day. Everything was so fun and interesting. I would have loved to make a
robot but I did prefer testing hydrogen.