Why do we Celebrate Halloween?

Halloween is a national holiday in many parts of the world. It is a festival that is celebrated on the October 31st of each year.

Origin Of Halloween

The famous Halloween has its origins dating back to the festival of Samhain which was a Celtic festival. Thousands of years ago, the northern European areas like Ireland, England, and France were inhabited by the Celts. The Celts celebrated their new year on the 1st of every November. They celebrated this day as the New Year because it marked the ending of summer. It was also the end of harvest. This day is also known for the beginning of winter which is cold and dark and symbolizes death. During that time, the Celts believed that the line between the world of living and death was blurred. That is why on the night of the 31st of October, the Celts celebrated Samhain. They believed that the ghosts came to life on that night. It was believed that the presence of the ghosts and spirits made it easier for the Celtic priests to predict the future. It was this belief that led the Celtic people to build huge bonfires and burn crops to offer sacrifices to Celtic priests. They also wore animal heads and dressed as ghosts to tell each other's fortunes. The same hearth fire was relit by the Celtics in the coming days to save themselves from the fire. This ritual for the night of 31st October continued for several coming years. It became a common celebration in colonial England. However, it took Halloween a lot of time to reach America. When the native Americans and European ethnic groups meshed, the celebration of Halloween made its way to America.

How to Include Halloween in Your Classroom

There are so many ways to incorporate this spooky holiday in your class which is what makes it one of the most fun to celebrate. Here are 4 quick and fun projects you may want to consider doing in your classroom:

1. Spooky Story of the Day
Students need to write their own spooky story that they read at the end of class. I find it good to set aside some class time to have us all write this as a group and then for about 2 weeks have students read their stories to the entire class. Best story wins a prize.

2. The Candy Toothpick Challenge
Give students about 30 toothpicks and your favorite gumdrop like candy. The goal is to build a structure that can support the most weight. They will form a matrix with the toothpicks interlocking with the candy. Then test all the structures to see which could hold the most weight.

3. Pump-cano
Everyone loves the gold old Science fair baking soda and citrus volcanoes. Why not create one inside a pumpkin? Students will need to learn a little bit about what is inside the pumpkin to devise the best formula for your pump-cano.

4. Food Chain Origami
This is a really cool activity. It does waste a great deal of paper though. It helps teach students the concept of the energy pyramid. You will need to do a little research and find 3 (or more) easy to make origami creatures that relate to the holiday. Note that each of the creatures should have various difficulty levels and take more time to create. As an example: you will find one that takes 30 seconds to create, another that takes a minute, and another that takes 2 minutes or more. The creatures that are quick to create will be the lowest on the food chain. Those that take the longest, are the highest. You will then have the students work in teams to create as many as they can in a set amount of time. Using our previous example and adding creatures to it may be something like this: bats (30 second construction), black cats (1 minute), Mummy (2 minutes). We would have students do this for 10 minutes and then see how many black cats the mummies would eat and how many bats the cats would eat.