La Castañada (in Catalan – Castanyada) is a festival that marks the end of summer and beginning of winter. It is celebrated traditionally on November 1st as the bellringers needed lots of food to keep them going as they rang the bells on All Saints Night for All Souls Day, and their families brought them roasted chestnuts as well as candied fruits.
The ‘image’ of the festival is La Castañera / Castanyera, an old lady dressed in peasant clothes and a headscarf, sitting behind a table, roasting chestnuts.
Here’s a story about her:
Below is a poem about her, and you can download a couple more (to colour) from this site)
And here’s a poem in Catalan about La Castanyada:
If you have a Twinkl subscription, you can download various resources on the subject including vocabulary, a presentation , a story, a game and some colouring sheets. La Castañada on Twinkl
As part of the Erasmus+ project that I’m involved in with my school, we participated in a celebration of La castañada at our Spanish partner school. Here’s a video that shows this.(from 2:30-3:20)
Earlier today I saw someone share that they had made an Advent calendar using AdventMyFriend. Not liking to actually sit and do just one thing, I decided to investigate and have a go myself whilst watching TV.
Below is the result!
Click the image to go to the calendar.
Really easy to do too!
1. Choose your background2. Give your advent calendar a title and click on Day 1 (or any other day – you don’t have to do them in order!)3. Decide if you want to add an image or a video to show behind your door.4. I added a video. Add a message too then click OK. 5. That door now has a tick to show it’s ready. Keep going until they’re all ticked.6. Once all the boxes are ticked, click preview to check it works then SHARE!
One you’ve finished, you can share your calendar to most social media platforms as well as sharing via email and embedding it into a website or blog.
I’m thinking that I’ll make another one with Christmas traditions from around the world. In the meantime, you’ll have to wait until December 1st before you can look behind the first door of the one above! Why not make your own in the meantime?
Taken at Colegio Esperanza, Tlaxcala November 2015
Films like Coco (watch it here), The Book of Life (trailer)and even James Bond have made this a festival that is much more well known than when I began teaching many moons ago!
*This is compilation of previous posts plus a couple of new ideas!*
This website is new and I love it! https://dayofthedead.holiday/ is well presented and comprehensive in explaining the festival – when, where, why, who and how – as well as offering ideas for how you can celebrate including make up tutorials, craft ideas and recipes.
This video is a helpful video that explains what happens during the festival, full of vocabulary and presented in steady clear Spanish.
And this one colourfully explains how indigenous festivals became mixed with catholicism to make the festival as it is today.
Finally I want to point out the Rockalingua song that has proved popular with my pupils in recent years. If you go to their website you can watch a video of the song as well as download the words, worksheets and other materials for free.
Taken in Mexico City 2015
I’ve shared ideas on this theme before; if you click on the images below, they’ll take you to the posts!
Crafts, a poem, a story and a song
This post was a review of a book all about a child getting his wires crossed (no thanks to his sister!) about what happens on Día de los Muertos. A lovely book – I recommend it!
I adore this video; it really simply explains what happens with no words and leads to amazing discussions. The post also includes many links to other materials and ideas including colouring, craft and downloadable PDFs to support lessons.
A video explaining the festival, a piece of music and a song.
An interesting news article about changes in the way Día de los Muertos is celebrated, and how it’s moving from private to more public. I was certainly struck when I landed in Mexico City on October 31st 2015 by the exuberance and spectacle of the street celebrations but also by the quiet of the personal celebrations by individuals on the subsequent days. I think there was a Halloween/Día de los Muertos divide going on, but that was my perception. Let me know your thoughts in the comments.
Thanks to José García Sánchez in the Secondary MFL Matters Facebook group for this lovely infographic/ map of European present givers. Whilst Christmas is past for most, Spain and those who follow the Orthodox calendar have another day or so before they receive their gifts on 6th January or Epiphany. I’ll certainly be thinking of activities to use this next year, perhaps preparing comprehension questions based around practising name of countries and / or nationalities but I’ll also be using it as soon as we go back to school as a way of eking out one last activity from the array of Christmas cards and greetings we received as part of our eTwinning projects.
Below are some images of our cards, temporarily taking over the Achievement Tree!
For the last few years, I’ve had the pleasure of teaching a lovely young Spanish lady at one of my schools. She has Basque heritage and last year, when I put on the ‘villancicos’ whilst we carried out our Christmas activities she asked if we could listen to Ole Olentzero. I obliged and the class were fascinated by the costumes and the unfamiliar words.
This year, today in fact, she asked once more if we could listen to it. I’d forgotten about it to be honest until I started it, but the class recognised it immediately. Here it is:
I decided to do some research and discovered that “Olentzero is a character in the Basque Christmas tradition. According to Basque traditions Olentzero comes to town late at night on the 24th of December to drop off presents for children.” There are various explanations of the origins of the tradition. One has Olentzero as one of jentillak, a mythological race of giants that lived in the Pyrenees. Another suggests that a newborn baby was found in the woods by fairies, blessed with the name Olentzero as well as kindness and strength and gifted to a childless couple. He grew to be a strong man who was a charcoal burner and made wooden toys that he gifted to children, and is said to have died saving children from a burning house leading to the fairies granting him eternal life.
“Nowadays, Olentzero is depicted as a lovable character, widely attributed to being overweight, having a huge appetite and thirst. He is depicted as a Basque peasant wearing a Basque beret, a farmer’s attire with traditional abarketa shoes and smoking a pipe. Whether he has a beard or not is not yet an established tradition. Sometimes his face is stained with charcoal, as a sign of his trade as a charcoal-burner. On Christmas Eve, groups of people or children carry effigies of Olentzero around on a chair through the streets, singing Olentzero carols and collecting food or sweets. At the end, it is customary in some places to burn the Olentzero.”
You can find out more about how the legend/story has developed here and you find an English translation of the story here. There’s also a short presentation about Christmas in the Basque country on Slideplayer.
Finally I discovered that there’s an old Basque proverb : Anything, anyone with a name exists if we believe in its/his/her existence. I think that could apply to many Christmas traditions!
Next year I shall have to remember to play this song as N is moving to Australia next week; perhaps we’ll have to Skype her! I wish her well.
And here’s a cute video with some facts and singing!
This article explains the importance of the poinsettia to Aztecs who called it cuetlaxochitl which means “mortal flower that perishes and withers like all that is pure.”
Here’s a story about The Legend of the Poinsettia:
https://youtu.be/pp8TSgpTSUI
And another story, this time about Las Posadas.
This site has links to lots of articles if you want to explore more, but I’ll leave you with a couple of Mexican Christmas songs.
The song that is sung during posadas:
A short radio programme with some suggestions of carols from the childhood of Betto Arcos en Veracruz, including Los peces en el río
As the clock in the Puerta del Sol in Madrid strikes midnight, people across Spain will be attemptig to eat 12 grapes before the ‘bongs’ finish.
As OrangePolkaDot tells us, the supermarkets sell special packs of twelve grapes to help you suceed!
Why? This blog post suggests that it is may have been due to a good grape harvest in 1909 (as does this post) or perhaps the converse.
Whatever, my advice is – make sure you have seedless, small grapes as you’ll never make it otherwise! The first New Years Eve I spent at my in-laws was hilarious thanks to my mother in law buying grapes so that I could ‘do my grape thing’ but choosing big fat seeded ones! That was a fun experience – good job I have a big mouth ;o)
Here’s a clip of a family celebrating ‘los doce uvas de la suerte’ (note the Mum doesn’t quite manage the feat!)
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QhfhaI_BsDU
I also like the other tradition that OrangePolkaDot highlights – wearing red undies. Sounds like a fun idea to me – but how ill anyone know if you’re ‘celebrating’? Unless Desigual are having another promotion…
Today is El Día de los Santos Inocentes in Spain and other Hispanic countries, their equivalent of April Fools Day. But it goes deeper than that as it has its roots in the story of Christmas when Herod ordered the killing of all baby boys, and Mary and Joseph escaped with Jesus having been warned in a dream to flee.
As we’re all taking down our Christmas decorations and enjoying the snow, (well, we are here having been granted a snow day!) in Spain and Mexico, children have been receiving their presents this morning, left for them by Los Reyes Magos.
So, to all of you, ¡Felices Reyes!
Here is a video of last year’s celebrations in Madrid. Enlightening and well worth using in class to show children what happens.
Here’s the start of an animated film from Mexico about Los Reyes Magos.
And not forgetting the hilarious clip I shared last year!
