At the beginning of his course, Mu divided the class into two groups to make dough figures of Sun Wukong (the Monkey King) and Zhu Wuneng (a pig monk also known as Zhu Bajie).

Mu demonstrated how to knead glutinous rice flour with the fingers and create curves.

Samples made by Mu were placed at the rostrum for children to try and imitate.

About 30 children took part in the class, all fascinated by the ancient cultural legacy.

A youngster concentrates on his dough figure creation during the thirteenth edition of the Shandong intangible cultural heritage classroom held on June 3 at the Shandong Provincial Cultural Center. [Photo/sdpc.cn]

"I'm very satisfied to be in the 'Monkey King' group," said six-year-old Ren Siqi, "I've watched both versions of the classic television series Journey to the West and my favorite character is Monkey King. I'll take my dough figure to my mom."

Sun Yixuan, a second-grader from Jinan Shungeng Primary School is already a regular at the intangible cultural heritage classroom.

"I really like my creation today. I have learned about dough figurines and I really enjoyed the do-it-yourself class," said Sun.

"My son can really learn something here and the class can help to cultivate his interest in arts and handicraft," said Ms Wu, Sun's mother.

"The weekly class is rather popular among children and it's not easy to get a seat."

Organized by the Shandong Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection Center, the classroom has been open every Saturday since March 4 to introduce and teach the province's intangible cultural heritages to kids.

Every course is taught by a state or provincial level intangible cultural inheritor and children between 6 and 12 can sign up for the classes.