By Tanya Steele
The Yering Primary School along with many others in the region upheld their own smaller Anzac Day ceremonies on Wednesday 26 April.
Deanna Cole, the school principal said it was an important ceremony for the school to mark.
“We attend our own ceremony every year and try to make it to one of the services on the day as well,” she said.
The school met with Bill Dobson, the Lilydale RSL President at the Coldstream Yering Memorial outside Coombe Cottage for the ceremony and Cr Fiona McCallister was also in attendance.
Mr Dobson said the RSL attend the primary school’s service every year.
“We think it’s important to go to the school, no matter their size,” he said.
The children participated in the service and Mr Donson said it was good to see them getting involved.
The school service included a prayer of remembrance, poetry readings by students, the minute’s silence and the last call, followed by wreath laying and a morning tea afterwards.
The primary school use a number of picture books to discuss Anzac Day and its history.
“We use books to educate and discuss the day,” Ms Cole said.
Discussing the topic as an educator is approached with care and thought at Yering Primary.
“We have a combined class and some of the kids are quite young,” Ms Cole said.
Ms Colel said the wearing of rosemary is something that children can participate in and discuss
“It is quite symbolic and we like to include it,” she said.
Australians wear a sprig as a traditional symbol of remembrance and commemoration days like Anzac or Remembrance Day.
Rosemary grows wild on the Gallipoli peninsula in Türkiye, where many Australians served in World War I and in the 1980s, cuttings of plants from Gallipoli were planted in nurseries throughout Australia.
“Rosemary is a plant of Remembrance,” Mr Dobson said.
Ms Cole said the kids also enjoy making Anzac biscuits, which they had had together as a school after their ceremony on Wednesday.
