Video: Origami Cranes Help Teach Peace at Columbus High

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COLUMBUS, Miss. ( WCBI) — Almost 70 years ago, a young girl named Sadako died in Japan. A victim of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, she had hoped to make one thousand paper cranes but died before reaching her goal. Her story became an inspiration for peace worldwide in the years since.

Students at Columbus High are learning to make paper cranes. It’s the Japanese art form known as origami.

“Things that you do, you usually remember them a little better,” says Art Teacher Sarah Oswalt.

It’s part of a lesson combining history with art.

“All academic aspects cross over. They can take a lesson from one class, use it in another. They can take techniques they learn in one class and apply it to another subject, ” says Oswalt.

Once the students make one thousand cranes, they will be mailed to Japan and placed at the Children’s Peace Monument, built-in Sadako’s honor.

” It’s really cool that something we did is going to be in a new country,” says  student Mary Owings.

It’s also a chance for students to live history while learning about World War II.

“Get them out of the classroom, get them out of a desk, open them up. When they see things and hear things that happen outside of school they can say hey I was a part of that, I got to participate in that, ” says History Teacher Sythia Ming.

Although learning origami wasn’t easy at first….

” It was hard at first but then with the help of my peers, I started to get better at it,” says student Jakyra Brookes.

” It was kind of hard at first but then I got to see how my teacher was doing it, so I got it and it was easy, ” says student Zaria Jenkins.

The students say they loved conquering a new challenge.

” When the 1st class went out they were saying can I have some more paper?,” says Mrs. Ming.

Paper that connects these students to the past, passing down a lesson about peace, giving them a chance to continue one students legacy that started almost 70 years ago.

Thousands of cranes are laid at the Children’s Peace Monument in Hiroshima each year from schools around the world.