Rolanda Sabaliauskaite

“Sometimes I heard stories of children who pretended to be sick because they were afraid of going to school. Not for me, I really liked going to school.” Rolanda Sabaliauskaite is a magician and performer: “I think that if I have chosen this job is also because of what I have learned in my school.”

“The school was like a second home to me.” Rolanda Sabaliauskaite had just turned 7 when she went to the Step by Step primary school in Vilnius, Lithuania. “There was a big carpet where we sat in circle in the morning. The teacher would invent a new greet of the day and then askedus how we felt, if we were happy or sad and why,” she says.

“It was really a good way to start the day because we got the chance to express ourselves without feeling judged. Most of us usually mentioned positive things,” she explains. "Another great activity was the shared toy: each class had one, ours was a parrot,” Rolanda says.

The teacher asked each child to take the parrot home, in turns. “The next day we would report about our day with the parrot to the whole class,” she adds. Also the parents would be asked to bring the parrot with them at work, as a way to invite them to talk with us about their main activities.

We often worked in groups and the presentations were done in front of the class, about different topics. It could be about a book they had read, or the lunch they had prepared for everyone, and some other times this presentation would involve sport activities.

“By working in groups we learned how to divide tasks, how to work in a team and to reach a certain objective together. Years later, when I was at university we would get lots of assignments and some fellow students would complain. I was always the one saying 'come on guys! It is not so difficult. We can do it! We have to divide the work and do our best,’” she relates.

“It was never boring,” she continues, “the best of the program was our teacher. I was always sitting with three other friends at the desk but we were never noisy. I really appreciated the fact that we had a class with many facilities. If we were learning math we could stand up and use the building blocks in the educational corner” she says.

“And it’s not that we learned less than others: we all passed the secondary school' s examination with top grades,” she adds.

Today Rolanda is 29 nine years old. She is a magician, bubble artist and speed painter and she travels around the world with her show. Her experience in primary school helps her still today.

“Before primary school I was a very shy child but at the end of the program that feature of me was gone. The many presentations I had made gave me the confidence to talk in front of a crowd. Today, I perform shows in duo that last an hour and a half. I think that if I have chosen this job is also because of what I’ve learned at school,” Rolanda reveals.

“Sometimes I heard stories of children being afraid to go to school and pretend to be sick. Not for me, I really liked going to school. I made many friends there. I hope more schools like the Sep by Step one will open. It made a huge difference to me and I hope that more kids get this chance” she concludes.