Many years ago at JLTAWA’s annual conference, Japan Foundation Sydney presented a session on Traditional Japanese Patterns which I found very interesting. I incorporated what I learnt at the session and created an activity where students designed their own DIY uchiwa fans by drawing either an existing Japanese pattern or inventing their own original pattern. I did this activity as a whole school activity for Culture Day and the students LOVED IT! Initially, I planned this for one lesson only but the introduction of the Japanese patterns and then the designing of the uchiwa took longer than just one lesson so I would recommend more time if you are intending to try out this activity.
At the time, I printed blank uchiwa template on card paper and used jumbo pop sticks as the handle. Each fan needed 2 pieces of the blank uchiwa template and 1 pop-stick. Normal glue stick worked amazing and held up well despite students really fanning/shaking them hard.
I’m not going to lie, there was a lot of prep to this, purchasing the card for the templates, printing out hundreds of these templates on the card using the very lousy school printer that kept jamming due to the card… The jumbo pop-sticks were also actually so hard to come by; I remember going to 3 different K-marts and various random craft stores to get enough for the whole school.
LUCKILY, WE SELL BLANK UCHIWA FANS FOR YOUR CONVENIENCE!
*Actual product might be different to this picture due to different batches from different suppliers
Please order in advance if ordering large numbers!
Despite the prep work, it was so rewarding to see the students enjoy this activity. I was also very surprised that a lot of the boys were also very proud of their work!
Amazing resources including ready-made PowerPoints and worksheets can be found on JPF’s website: