Last Friday 17 May at Yew Chung International School of Beijing (YCIS Beijing), we put on our first annual talent show! Students from across our Primary School, with support from Theatre Teacher, Freda Humber and our Performing Arts Department staff, worked very hard to put on an impressive showing for parents, teachers, staffers and their peers. Hosted in the YCIS Beijing auditorium, the eclectic blend of high-energy performances had the rapt audience clapping and rocking in their seats throughout the show.

Though the show in total lasted roughly two and a half hours, with Years 1-3 performing in the morning and Years 4-5 in the afternoon, students and staff had been preparing for the big day for six weeks. During the two-week-long initial call for entries, 70 student acts applied! It took two weeks to finish auditioning all of our eager entertainers, and acts were ultimately selected based on their stage presence (confidence in performing), readiness, and for variety (to avoid too many similar performances) not on any judgement of talent (how could we, when they were all so good). Following the selection of our participants, the final two weeks were spent with students frantically practising after school and during breaks. We also held two run-throughs before the event where basic blocking (positioning of performers on stage) and timings were worked out.

On the day of the show, students took to the stage, which our teachers had carefully prepared with all of the audio-visual, lighting, and support equipment they required, and blew everyone away. The performers who graced the YCIS Beijing auditorium stage on the day are listed at the end of this article, in order of performance and by their act.

Following the close of the fantastic festivities, Mr James Sweeney, Vice-Principal & Head of Primary, shared his thoughts on our inaugural talent show: “I’m pleased with how today has turned out. The student performers rose to the occasion and came prepared to entertain. Performance events such as this talent show are essential to allow us to see and share what our students have achieved outside of school and academics. We have an incredibly talented cohort of students with a wide variety of talents.

The talent show was an excellent way for our students to build up their confidence and become accustomed to performing in front of large audiences. Furthermore, by preparing and organising themselves for the big occasion, it allowed students to exercise their self-regulation skills.We now need to work out how we can make this even bigger and better in future”.