There seems to be a lot of factors that go into the decision of whether to have a Halloween party in the classroom. Most of it depends on the school district and the principal and it's not an easy decision for them to make.
As a kindergartener, my oldest daughter had Halloween parties in her classroom. She was able to dress up in costume and makeup. I, being the room mom, would decorate the classroom with ghosts, streamers, and make gravestones by placing brown paper bags onto the backs of the students chairs. We played games like "pin the wart on the witch" and ate severed fingers and drank vampire blood. It was great fun. However, when my younger daughter hit the elementary years, the rules were changed to no costumes, no ghosts or witches, the food had to be pre-wrapped from the store and the games needed to be academic.
Today, I subbed in a kindergarten classroom that had a pumpkin party. Other teachers were calling it a fall party or a harvest party and I couldn't help but wish for the old days of dressing up and filling the classroom with an imaginary world. This led me to think how I could incorporate both types of parties once I have my own classroom so that everyone could feel included.
You see the main problem with Halloween parties is that now that our society embraces so many different cultures, we need to be respectful of these cultures. There is also the religious factor. Not all religions celebrate a "Day of the Dead" or an "All-Saints Day". There are many religions that don't celebrate anything that may have the word "holiday", "party", or "celebration" in it. So, what happens if a teacher does do a Halloween party is that the student from that religion or culture is not able to attend school... and I definitely don't want that. I want all my students, no matter what their beliefs, to be able to attend school and know that I have created a safe environment for them.
So, that is why today we had a Pumpkin Party. We "estimated" how many seeds were in a pumpkin and the students grabbed a handful of gooeyness from inside and counted what they pulled out, we decorated pumpkin shaped cookies, we colored pumpkin sheets, we weighed pumpkins and sang "5 Little Pumpkins Sitting on a Fence" Everyone was happy and everyone attended school, life was good to a 5 year old.
Although I miss the traditional Halloween Parties I used to do as a room mom, I do understand why we can no longer have them.
As a kindergartener, my oldest daughter had Halloween parties in her classroom. She was able to dress up in costume and makeup. I, being the room mom, would decorate the classroom with ghosts, streamers, and make gravestones by placing brown paper bags onto the backs of the students chairs. We played games like "pin the wart on the witch" and ate severed fingers and drank vampire blood. It was great fun. However, when my younger daughter hit the elementary years, the rules were changed to no costumes, no ghosts or witches, the food had to be pre-wrapped from the store and the games needed to be academic.
Today, I subbed in a kindergarten classroom that had a pumpkin party. Other teachers were calling it a fall party or a harvest party and I couldn't help but wish for the old days of dressing up and filling the classroom with an imaginary world. This led me to think how I could incorporate both types of parties once I have my own classroom so that everyone could feel included.
You see the main problem with Halloween parties is that now that our society embraces so many different cultures, we need to be respectful of these cultures. There is also the religious factor. Not all religions celebrate a "Day of the Dead" or an "All-Saints Day". There are many religions that don't celebrate anything that may have the word "holiday", "party", or "celebration" in it. So, what happens if a teacher does do a Halloween party is that the student from that religion or culture is not able to attend school... and I definitely don't want that. I want all my students, no matter what their beliefs, to be able to attend school and know that I have created a safe environment for them.
So, that is why today we had a Pumpkin Party. We "estimated" how many seeds were in a pumpkin and the students grabbed a handful of gooeyness from inside and counted what they pulled out, we decorated pumpkin shaped cookies, we colored pumpkin sheets, we weighed pumpkins and sang "5 Little Pumpkins Sitting on a Fence" Everyone was happy and everyone attended school, life was good to a 5 year old.
Although I miss the traditional Halloween Parties I used to do as a room mom, I do understand why we can no longer have them.
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