Easter - Crafts, Maths, MFL and RE too!

[Jo Rhys-Jones]

Now's the sort of time I tend to hunt around for end-of-term Easter themed activities in a panic - having always left it to the week before. So I'll start with a list of some of my favourite French websites with the usual craft, make'n'do and songs with an Easter theme:

Vive Paques! - Childrens' site entirely devoted to online games, stories, cards, recipes and printable craft activities all with a French Easter theme and FREE

Tete a Modeler - French website with games, puzzles, crafts and activities, practice in writing, e-cards, simple craft activities and decorating ideas on the theme of Easter.

Momes.net - Information about the traditions and story of Easter, as well as quizzes, activities, an online dictionary and songs, all in French.

Coin des Petits -Various days to celebrate throughout the year in French.

But what about something a little more...meaty?? I've only recently discovered Village des Petits Artistes - lots of Easter ideas - usual craft stuff - but scroll to bottom and find very simple Easter maths and science and more cross-curricular printouts. For example try this Colour-by-numbers activity; or if you've been looking at Food check out what this rabbit is eating.

But to get away from all these lovely chocolate / spring ideas and possibly re-insert a little meaning into Easter again, Cate Ouest is a very interesting and useful site. Essentially it's a French Catholic site with ideas and activities for children - useful sections for teachers or 'animateurs' on celebrations such as xmas, lent, fete des rois etc. looking for RE/Intercultural Understanding links. If you enter and click on the 3-7 section click on the cross for an animation with gestures, sound and words for the Lord's Prayer in French. It's very simple and clear. The children may even be able to work out for themselves what it is without you telling them. Can you give an older group of yr 6 perhaps the text afterwards but sliced up and get them to put it back in order.

Then click on the poster in the backgroun of the room for a simplified version of the Easter story for children in French. The animation and story are very easy to understand and it may help reinforce their understanding of the story after having heard it in RE / assembly.

Of course you can always go back to click on the art materials for a simple step-by-step craft demo!

There are ideas from the Teachers resource Exchange for looking at Easter in German and Happy Easter.org has some background about the festival in English.

In Spanish you might try this wiki which has soooo much information or make this little basket for your Easter eggs in Spanish.

AND NOW HAVE ATTACHED A POWERPOINT & SMART NOTERBOOK FOR EASTER IN FRENCH - CLICK HERE

[Lisa Stevens]

Here are some further refs for Spanish speaking countries -
http://easterwishes.blogspot.com/2007/03/spanish-easter.html - about Mexico
some ecards in Spanish - http://cards.123india.com/cgi-bin/newcards/showthumbs.pl?q1=eapr_easter_spanish&log=india123
And what about a recipe for torrijas - delicious!! http://spanish-food.suite101.com/article.cfm/spanish_easter_cakes
Vocabulary of Easter here - http://www.123teachme.com/learn_spanish/spanish_for_kids_19
and information about Spanish Easter here - http://www.easterbunnys.net/spanisheaster.htm

looking for some videos now!

[Lisa Stevens]

Here's slideshow of pictures from Sevilla - http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=9RMGhJucd-s

And a couple of videos of parades - there are lots more too!!
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=9T267y3hWz0
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=UyV5Mnr3bs8

Hope they help :o)

[Isabelle Jones]

Thank you Lisa and Jo
As usual, your useful ideas may just ensure we keep sane for the last few days before the Easter break!

IsabelleDelete Comment

[Jo Rhys-Jones]

Thanks for the links Lisa - I've just added a ppt and an IWB file on Easter on the forum (see link in the post) if anyone fancies adapting them for German Spanish Italian etc please feel free!

[Julie Prince]

I've been trying to find some exciting Spanish activities for Easter (have lots of French ones but hardly any Spanish) so thanks for this Jo.
I've had a go at simplifying the text on the Easter basket activity and have also translated it - not for the children but for the teachers I'm working with, who will be using the activity. Here it is...

Cestita para los huevos de Pascua (little basket for Easter eggs)

1) Dibuja un cuadrado de 20 x 20 cm (draw a 20 x 20 cm square).
2) Recorta el cuadrado (cut out the square).
3) Dobla el cuadrado en dos, uniendo dos puntas (Fold the square in half, corner to corner).
4) Dobla una punta lateral sobre el triangulo (fold in the point from one side over the triangle).
5) Dobla la otra punta lateral (fold in the point from the other side).
6) Remonta la punta de arriba por encima de la cestita (fold the top point over the basket).
7) Remonta la otra punta sobre la cesta (fold the other point over the basket).
8) Recorta una tira de 15 cm de largo y 1 cm de ancho (cut out a strip 15 cm long and 1 cm wide).
9) Pega las extremidades a los bordes de la cesta (stick the ends to the edges of the basket).
10) Llena la cesta con huevos de colores (fill the basket with coloured eggs).

Please feel free to point out any errors I may have made or if you can improve on the translation.

If I were teaching this myself I would probably spend some time teaching the main vocab with actions (recorta, dobla, pega, llena, etc.) so the children could eventually access the text themselves, with a bit of help. There are lots of other activities they could do, such as matching the instructions to the pictures, putting the instructions in order, etc. By the time they come to make the basket they will have a good idea what to do. I always worry about these craft activities with all the instructions in the FL - if you just give them to the children there's little point, really. They won't understand them and will just go off the diagrams and ignore the text - so why do it in Spanish in the first place?

[Jo Rhys-Jones]

Great ideas - thanks Julie - glad to hear you are 'back at it' down under already!