Access Students Celebrating American Holidays

During the week leading up to the 31^st of October Access scholarship students learned in detail about the history and origins of the American holiday, Halloween. Using the book “Celebrate Holidays in the U.S.A” as a supplement for the American culture part of the curriculum, students became familiar with symbols and rituals of Halloween before eventually celebrating it on Oct 31. This past October, on Halloween day all 20 Access students participated in a pumpkin carving contest which was set up between the two Access classes. The pumpkins were purchased at a local vegetable exposition in UB. Students displayed their team work, co-operation and talents during the contest. Typical Halloween candy, which had been sent from America was given out to all the students as a prize for participating in the pumpkin carving competition. After the contest, the class participated in a round table free- talk discussion in English, over a news article that had been printed out concerning belief in ghost amongst American people, which featured recent polls from thousands of Americans.

The following month, Access scholarship students, along with the EARC staff, participated in a traditional sit-down Thanksgiving dinner featuring popular American food, including chicken, salad and buckwheat. The students reviewed what they had learned about, concerning the origins and practice of the Thanksgiving holiday, an official American Holiday, which has deep roots in American culture.  The students also learned a traditional Thanksgiving holiday song, “Over The River And Through The Woods,” and performed it several times for the EARC staff.