Teaching Day-by-Day: Celebrations

Week One - Getting Started
1. Today is May Day! With your students, learn why it's also called International Workers' Day or The "Real" Labor Day. Visit www.mayweek.ab.ca to find out more.
2. Brainstorm meanings for the word celebrate – add rejoice and commemorate to your list. With the class, make a list of things we celebrate. Examine morphemes and related words like re- (repeat, revise), joy (joyful, enjoyable), memory and celebration to build students' vocabularies.
3. Visit www.earthcalendar.net to find a daybook of holidays and celebrations around the world. Find holidays by country, religion or phase of the moon. Click the "Today" button to see holidays observed on this date.

Week Two - Researching holidays


4. Have students find out what countries their families came from. Search the website you discovered on May 3 for holidays in these countries and find out if your students' families continue any of traditions.
5. Today is Cinco De Mayo in Mexico (and elsewhere)! Ask if any of your students know what holiday this is or celebrates it. Use a search engine like Google or go to the website you visited May 3 to find out more about the holiday.
6. Look on the website www.kidlink.org/KIDPROJ/MCC to find a multicultural calendar by month, country and holiday. Have your students find what other holidays are celebrated in May, by whom, where and why?

7. Sunday is Mother's Day! Collaborate with the art teacher to help your students make cards for their mothers and/or grandmothers. They can also send an electronic card via the website www.yahoo.americangreetings.com
8. Brainstorm questions students have about holidays. Then, go to www.shagtown.com/days where holidays are grouped alphabetically. Type in the questions and read answers provided by Dr. Holiday.
9. Ask the students if they know on what day we celebrate Father's Day. Does anyone celebrate Children's Day or Grandparents' Day? In what special way to they mark these occasions?
10. Do action research by having students visit a grocery store, card shop or drugstore to find out what kinds of cards are sold, for what occasions and their cost. Create a data chart to summarize findings and discuss them.

Week Three - More on holidays


11. Ask each student to bring in a greeting card that they or a family member received. Find the company that made each card, the cost, what holidays they honor, etc. Create a data chart to summarize findings and discuss them.

12. Celebrations deserve songs! Visit www.niehs.nih.gov to hear song lyrics to sing along with and/or to print. Sing the song, "Happy and You Know It, Clap Your Hands," and create some new holiday-specific lyrics.
13. Do the math to find out how many cards a family might send in a year for different occasions and what the cost would be using an average price per card. Do your students think that other countries seem to follow our card-sending ritual?
14. On a calendar, list each student's birthday on the appropriate month and day. Share the newspaper horoscope with students so they can decide if they are a Leo, Scorpio, etc. and read horoscopes to them. Do they agree with their day's horoscope?
15. Today is Armed Forces Day! It's the day to celebrate men and women in all branches of the service. Find out more at www.holidayinsights.com
16. Explore the zodiac at www.horoscope.com with students. Have students create their own sign with magic markers and colored pencils and write a horoscope for their birthdate.
17. Teach your class about Leap Year, which occurs every four years when the month of February has 29 days. Ask them to figure out how old a person would be (technically) if he or she were born on February 29, 1995?

Week Four - Birthdays, Weddings and Anniversaries


18. Group students by their "sign" (the Leos, Scorpios, etc.) and have them find out what each horoscope means, where horoscopes originated and how people used them.
19. With the students, find out about different wedding customs around the world and how practices vary by visiting www.lawrence.org
20. After reviewing the information on yesterday's website, have your students brainstorm some ideas on what they think should be part of a "traditional" American wedding and why. Encourage them to think of something they'd like to see included in their own future weddings.
21. Which Presidents do we honor in February? On what days were they born? Talk about why we celebrate these two birthdays in particular, when we do it and how students feel about this. What, in their opinion, are the qualifications for getting your birthday made a national holiday?
22. Why do we celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day in January? Who was he and what did he do? Hear his famous speech at www.historychannel.com Have students write their own "I Have a Dream" speeches and read them to each other.
23. Have students interview their family to see what anniversaries they celebrate. Teach students that anno means year. What special rituals does each family observe on these anniversaries?

24. Today is Victoria Day in Canada (also known as Firecracker Day!). Read about it at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_Day and ask your students to decide which of our holidays it is most similar to.

Week Five - Finishing Up


25. Read about Valentine's Day with a book like The Day it Rained Hearts by Felicia Bond (Laura Geringer, 2001) or The Very Special Valentine by Maggie Kneen (Chronicle, 2004). Discuss reasons why February 14 is such a popular day.
26. For games, crafts, printable activities and zodiac information about Chinese New Year, visit www.kidsdomain.com
27. Many countries observe Thanksgiving. Find out when it is celebrated in Canada and Mexico and why the dates are different than in the U.S. What are your students thankful for all year long?
28. Find out about Kwanzaa, an African-American and Pan-African holiday that is a celebration of family, community and culture, at www.officialkwanzaawebsite.org
29. Have small groups of students create collages using magazines, fabric and objects to represent one of the holidays they learned about. Have everyone share and explain their artwork and post it for others to enjoy.
30. Today is Memorial Day in the United States. What and who do we remember on this day? How do we celebrate it? How is it different from Armed Forces Day?
31. Have students write stories about a holiday of their own creation. Make sure they include how and when it is celebrated and its history. Share the stories and post for others to enjoy.

Karen Bromley is a Professor of Literacy in the School of Education and Human Development at Binghamton University in Binghamton, NY where she teaches graduate courses in literacy, language arts and children's literature.

May, 2004, Vol.34, No.8