A New Taipei City principal is using origami to expand the learning experience for children at his school.
Sanchong District’s (三重) Jimei Elementary School principal Wu Wang-ju (吳望如) said he is dedicated to arts education.
Wu said he learned to be a capable paper folder and cutter through personal experience.
“Back in my youth, we did not have money to buy toys, so we made them ourselves,” Wu said.
Using paper from workbooks and calendars, Wu and his friends folded different kinds of paper planes, he said.
One of his friends used pages from textbooks to make planes, he said, adding with a laugh that at the end of the semester his friend had nothing left but the cover of his textbooks.
Wu’s work includes models of a French Mirage fighter jet and US-made F-14s, with most of them being the result of plenty of experimentation.
“I have great interest in folding paper and am always trying different methods,” Wu said, adding that he folds diagonally one time and horizontally the next just to experiment and see the results.
Wu said he earned 50 euros (US$64) during a visit to Italy when he and his friends folded paper balloons and other trinkets for curious passers-by.
He said children these days are prone to thinking linearly, which greatly hampers their imagination.
Wu said that if he was able to stimulate children to think differently through learning origami, not only has he passed on an art, he has also taught them how to think creatively.
Chung Yun-jen (鐘雲珍), one of Wu’s former pupils, who is now studying in the department of advertising at the Chinese Culture University, said she was thankful for her origami lessons at elementary school.
“Paper folding taught me that there is more than one answer to a challenge,” Chung said, adding that to her, life held as many possibilities as paper can be folded into different shapes.
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