Learning about Pchum Ben at our preschool in Phnom Penh

Learning About Pchum Ben Through Hands-On Experience

In celebration of Pchum Ben, our children at Orange Crest Preschool had the opportunity to learn the traditional way of making and rolling Bay Ben rice balls.

Beyond the hands-on activity, they also learned about the meaning and significance of Pchum Ben and the traditions that have been passed down through generations.

At Orange Crest Preschool, we believe cultural learning should be something children can see, experience, and understand for themselves. Through activities like this, we hope our children grow up appreciating their heritage, preserving Cambodian traditions, and feeling proud of their culture.

It began in the hall

The hall screen showing the Pchum Ben title slide, with an illustration of a pagoda and families bringing offerings — The morning opened with the festival itself, on the big screen.

Children from across the school sitting on the hall floor and on benches, facing the screen and their teachers — The whole school, in one room.

Before anybody touched the rice, the children were told what Pchum Ben is: the pagoda, the offerings, and the families who have kept the custom going for generations.

And the children had plenty to say

A teacher holding a microphone, speaking to the children in the hall — A teacher takes the first turn.

A small girl speaking into a handheld microphone held in front of her, classmates watching — Then the microphone went to them.

It was not a lecture. The microphone went round, the questions came back, and the answers were given by children small enough to need the microphone held for them.

Then the aprons went on

Two members of staff at the front table preparing bananas and rice on trays — Everything laid out at the front first: rice, bananas, a bowl each.

The long wooden table lined with children in aprons, each with a plate and a bowl of rice — A place, a plate and a portion for every child.

Every child had an apron, a bowl and gloves — and their own portion to work. Nobody watched a demonstration and went home. Rolling a rice ball is harder than it looks when your hands are small.

Rolling the rice

A teacher guiding a boy’s gloved hands as he presses rice into a ball — Hands around hands, until the shape holds.

A boy concentrating as he presses a ball of sticky rice together in gloved hands — Pressed, turned, pressed again.

A child spooning rice from a bowl onto the parcel in front of them — Measuring out the next one.

This is the part a photograph of a festival never shows: the concentration. Rice sticks. Gloves slip. A ball that looks right falls apart when you set it down, and you start again.

And it was funny

A girl laughing with her hands held up to the camera, fingers covered in sticky rice — The best part of the morning, for several of them.

Big on Character. Close as a Family. A tradition a child has had their hands inside is one they remember — and this is how our preschool in Toul Kork, Phnom Penh teaches the Cambodian year: not as a date on a calendar, but as a morning they take part in.

For enrollment information, please contact us

Phone number: 092 88 96 99. Telegram: https://t.me/orangecrestpreschool. Or come and see a morning like this one for yourself — tours run Monday to Friday 07:30–17:00 and Saturday 08:00–12:00.