The 12 Chinese Zodiac Sign

Date: 10th January 2013
Day: Thursday
Time: 4:30 - 5:30pm

We revised through the list of words that we had gone through during our snake topic. Besides that, the children wanted to listen to the "Nian" monster's story again. I didn't retell the story but getting the children to fill in the gap. They can remember most of the part of the story.

Then we went into the discussion about the 12 Chinese Zodiac Sign.

Teacher: What do you know about the Chinese Zodiac Sign?
Children: (they looked a little puzzled and not sure what to reply)
Teacher: This year 2013 is the year of snake
Jia Jia: Oh, I know. I'm a pig.
Teacher: Jia Jia was born in the year of pig. How about the rest of you?
Yu Xi: I'm a dog.
Kwan Ming: I'm a mouse. (I corrected that it's a rat)
Kern Ee: Me too. I'm a mouse.

There were also some other replies from the floor but the children were mostly born in the mixture of pig, dog and rat. There's a few version of the story about the Chinese Zodiac Sign. However, I chose this one to tell to the children with some help of the picture that I had prepared.

This is the version of the story that I had told the children:

Long long time ago, Jade emperor wanted a way to measure time and year. Therefore, he decided to inform all the animals to have a race across the flowing river. The first 12 animals who successfully made it to the other side of the river bank will have a place in the Zodiac sign for the year.

All the animals waited at the other side of the river bank. There's this rat and a cat also wish to take part but they were poor swimmer. So the rat suggested that they climbed up to the ox and asked him for help to cross the river. The kind ox agreed. So the rat and the cat crossed the river on the back of the ox. But the tricky rat pushed the cat into the river just right before they could reached the other side of the river. The tricky rat jumped in front of the ox making him to be the 1st to be named of the year. The ox is named for the 2nd year.

Then the tiger struggled its way and managed to be the 3rd animal to arrive. The rabbit didn't know how to swim but it is clever. It hopped on the log that it could find in the river. The rabbit was the 4th. At the same time, down came the dragon. The Jade Emperor was curioused and asked: "You can fly, why are you so late?" The dragon replied: "On my way here, I heard some villages were having draught and I made some rain for them." The Jade Emperor was happy and made the dragon the 5th animal.

From far, the hooves of the horse can be heard. The Jade Emperor was expecting to see a horse. However, when the horse reached the river bank, suddenly a snake sneaked out from the horse leg and frightened it to back off. The snake took the 6th place followed by the horse. Then not long later, came the goat, monkey and a rooster on a raft. The Jade Emperor named the goat to be the 8th followed by the monkey and the rooster.

The dog arrived shortly. The Jade Emperor asked;" Why are you so late?" "The river was so clean so I took a bath on my way here," replied the dog. The Jade Emperor named the 11th place for the dog. Last came the pig. "I found a lot of food on my way here and had a good sleep too. Am I late?" the pig asked. Jade Emperor was impressed that the pig still made his way here and named him the 12th place. Now the cat only managed to get itself out of the river. As all the 12 animals had arrived, there's no place for the cat. The cat was so furious and being enemy with the rat.

We shall have some other activities about the 12 Chinese Zodiac Sign for the next few days.