Methodist Preschool Poppy, Sunflower Classes Display 1,000 Wishes

By SARAH SHMERLING | Editor-in-Chief

The Methodist Preschool of Pacific Palisades Poppy and Sunflower classes hosted the “1,000 Wishes for the World Exhibition” on May 23 as part of a mixed-media project that involved the community at large.

Over the course of a few months, the children, who are ages 4 and 5, worked on a mixed-media art project using handmade paper cranes. The class read story books related to the paper, one of which was “Sadako’s Cranes” by Judith Loske.

“This book tells the story of Sadako Sasaki, who lived in Hiroshima in 1945,” the teachers explained. “Unfortunately, due to the atomic bombing, Sadako became sick. She hears of a Japanese legend which says that a person who folds 1,000 paper cranes can make a wish, so she begins folding cranes. Sadako’s wish is to get better.”

The students, inspired by the story, made their own wishes for the world written down on paper cranes. They collected wishes from the Palisades community by reaching out to local schools, hosting wish drives and publishing a call for wishes in the Palisadian-Post.

“We are making 1,000 paper cranes with wishes for the world,” the students wrote in a letter to the Post during the project. “We want to share our story with the Palisades community. We need to get 1,000 wishes.”

The paper cranes were on display in an exhibition as a river, where visitors were invited to walk over a wooden bridge to view them, while listening on individual headphones to the wishes being read by students.

Another facet of the exhibition was an animated re-telling of Sadako’s story, as well as a “gift shop” where children made T-shirts, tote bags, key chains and bracelets to sell, with proceeds going to Children’s Hospital Los Angeles.

“The children were overwhelmed by the response as the wishes poured in, along with so many stories of community members’ own connections to the story,” the school shared. “The Poppy and Sunflower children worked tirelessly, with the support of our neighboring schools and community members, and exceeded their goal of 1,000 paper cranes. The 1,000th ‘giant’ crane was folded and signed by all Yellow Room children. The exhibition was the culmination of all their hard work.”

The cranes will now be donated to a larger exhibition at the Museum of Tolerance.