Vamos Carnaval!

Because it is of the most utmost importance that ever month at school we have a holiday to celebrate, this month we celebrated Carnaval. It was also our schools 25th anniversary. Although the most famous Carnavals are in Cadiz and the Canary Islands, Andres Segovia had its own mini Carnaval!! Each cycle had its own theme that they had to dress up as. Our cycle, which consists of third and forth grade, decided to dress up as the school. All the kids dressed up as the professors, families, and kitchen staff of the school and the professors dressed up as the kids! So the teachers of third and forth grade dressed up as school girls complete with Hannah Montana/High School Musical/Jonas Brothers accessories haha! Our cycle also made up a Carnaval song called a chirigota that poked fun of the goings on at school like the things that happen during recess to homework to the cafeteria food. Since the kids always learn songs in English and study really hard, I told them I would "learn" the song in Spanish. Since they think I don't speak any Spanish, they flipped out when I started singing in Spanish. It was great! After a week of preparation and rehearsal, Friday finally arrived!

Once lunch time began, all the teachers started to get dressed up in their costumes. At 1:30 we all went down to the library in full costume for a special lunch! It was so funny to see everyone dressed up and eat some delicious food. Around 2 all the kids and parents came up to get dressed in their costumes too. All the kids were really decked out with clothes, makeup, wigs, props, everything! The kids who dressed up as professors had to dress up as one of the teachers at school and 2 kids dressed up as me!! Then everyone went down to the basketball court outside where the Spanish parents were awaiting because they come for everything and film/take pictures the entire time. Each cycle preformed something or walked around in a parade to a song to show off their costumes. The youngest kids were ocean creatures in one class and people from different countries in the other class. The second grade kids dressed up as presents, candy, and confetti to celebrate the schools birthday. Our cycle got up to preform the chirigota which everyone loved! All the parents said we did really well and the kids had a great time dancing and singing. Finally the oldest group of kids in 6th grade started a funeral parade carrying a paper sardine. Burying a sardine is a Carnaval tradition that represents burying your fears, so our school made a huge paper sardine. Each child colored a scale and put something they were scared of on the back. The whole school gathered in a big circle and our music teacher burned the sardine to end the Caranval! It was by far my favorite holiday I've celebrated at school!

Burning the Sardine our school made, notice the teachers trying to keep the kids back hahaha.

The five year olds as Indians, so cute!!!

One of my kids, Alejandro, dressed as one of the teachers Laurentino.

Me with one of the girls who dressed as me, her name is Maria! Don't we look alike??

The teachers in my cycle dressed up as schoolgirls, wigs and all!