Celebrating Diwali

Today we had a lovely Diwali celebration at the school. We began with a special guest -- two classical Indian dancers. They put on a wonderful presentation and, at the end, all of the children in the school were invited to get up and dance!

Classical Indian Dances Directory

I read "Lakshmi and the clever washerwoman" from Festivals Together: A Guide to Multi-Cultural Celebrationand photocopied some of their Rangoli designs for the children to color.




I found this story to be a good fit (in the past, children have made their own divas, so they are familiar with how this holiday is celebrated); however, if you are looking for a more complete resource for storytelling, try Indian Tales and Legends





Other wonderful designs to color can be found in Paisleys and Other Textile Designs from India




My fellow teacher found this wonderful YouTube video of a family creating their Rangoli. We would like to do this on the floor with colored sand one day!

Here's a link to some craft projects and a Creating your own Rangoli how-to.

Finally, we ended the day by sampling some special Indian foods.