WASHINGTON, DC -- The sound of children’s gleeful shouts rang from the walls of Lisa Hedgepeth’s fifth grade class at Langdon Elementary School in Northeast Washington DC, as they hosted the graduating class of the Lower Deadman’s Cay Primary School from Long Island, Bahamas, Wednesday, May 19.

The Embassy of The Bahamas is a partner in the Adopt-A-School program co-sponsored by Washington Public Schools and the Washington Performing Arts Society, and while the students from Long Island were in Washington DC on their class trip, they took the opportunity to connect with students at Langdon, the Embassy’s adopted school.

Miss Hedgepeth and her class are studying The Bahamas this semester, with a special focus on Junkanoo. With this focus in mind, the students from Lower Deadman’s Cay Primary, led by their teacher, Rosemary Burrows, prepared a Junkanoo display of their own for the DC children.

To the drumming of fellow-graduate Bernard Seymour, Prefects Claire Fox and Altaneece Farquharson led the exuberant Long Islanders in a “rush,” shaking bottles filled with sand and blowing whistles and other noisemakers.

The group also included school Head Boy Dylan Fox, Head Girl Dana Knowles, Deputy Head Girl Leah Burrows and her mother, Jason Stubbs and Nickeen Pratt, and parents Margaret Fox and Deborah Ferguson.

After the students from The Bahamas showed them the way, the students from Northeast Washington eagerly joined in and together they “rushed” back and forth in the classroom, laughing and shouting.

After the demonstration, Langdon teacher Lisa Hedgepeth said: “It is really a treat for our class. It really brings it home for us.”

The Langdon students performed a Junkanoo dance they had prepared, to the delight of their Long Island comrades.

The Long Islanders presented the class with a brand new Junkanoo board game, some straw work and two maps of The Bahamas.