Building on the 2018-19 drought, it then brought fires and floods, the COVID lockdown and Black Lives Matter movement into rapidly changing focus. It's a year most of us were glad to be rid of for multiple reasons.

But for some school students, especially those in early learning, kindergarten and junior school, it was seen through varying lenses of impressions and change, some even exciting, which for many was just another of a young life's learning processes.

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For families there were possibly more hours of close contact between parents and children than had occurred in several generations. The significant home study and home working arrangements changed life for all, especially in April 2020.

An exhibition originally intended for the 2021 Bowral Show, scheduled to run on January 9 and 10, but which was cancelled at a week's notice due to concerns from COVID and the Northern Beaches lockdown event, is now showing at the Artheart Gallery at 280 Argyle Street, Moss Vale.

Many of the shire's students from pre-school to Year 6 have poems, other writing and artworks on display. The exhibition, displayed in both galleries, is open to the public each Saturday until the end of March. The show is open from 10.00am until 2.00pm, on Saturday March 13, 20 and 27.

Katherine Wood, herself a pioneer in early childhood learning across the state of NSW, along with Virginia O'Neill, were to be the co-ordinators of the exhibit for the Bowral Show. Both have been involved with the revised exhibit, hosted and hung by Arthead's Sonja Millis.

Works have been made available through the Bowral Show Society Inc., coming from schools throughout the shire, from Burrawang, Bowral, Glenquarry, Kangaloon, Mittagong and Exeter Public Schools, the Southern Highland Christian School and Mittagong Pre-school.

"This work is so important," stated Katherine Wood. "It's important both to the children, their parents and generally to the community because it shows how children do develop and grow, what they are capable of, which in the case of this exhibition, is truly surprising and inspiring."

The Bowral Show Society expressed their appreciation of Arthead's sponsorship and its principal, Sonja Millis, in making the Artheart Gallery space available, as well as hanging and displaying all the work.

There is a donation box for the Bowral Show Society Inc., the proceeds of which will go towards funding the production of a book of the work, which organisers hope to make available later in 2021.

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