Carnaval

This past Tuesday we in the states recognize as Mardi Gras, but here in Guatemala Carnaval was in full swing. The students had been preparing their costumes for days leading up to Carnaval and each classroom had to come up with a theme and all the kids made costumes relating to that theme. The costumes were all hand made with mostly reusable and recyclable materials. The costumes ranged from Alice and Wonderland, where all the kids dressed up as cards, to life size robots made of cardboard boxes, to children of the corn made from real corn husks. The creativity was endless!

Molly and some of her 4th grade class!

My preschoolers---corn children!

Robots taking over the costume competition--handmade
by the students!

My special education class dancing with Karla. Karla is picking flowers
and vegetables and the kids are dressed as different things you would find in a garden.

The day began with "normal" classes, but all of the students were so excited for the coming events that not much could be accomplished. In my special education class we talked about shapes and colors and then made AMAZING Carnaval masks and my other classes for the day were canceled due to the festivities.

Luis and Pablo wearing there Carnaval masks we made
while learning about colors and shapes.

Mid morning all of the students began preparing and dressing in their costumes for the big costume competition...everyone wanted to win first prize. Who got to judge the competition?? Yes....the English department volunteers. Jess, Molly, Meghan and I sat on stage at a long table with our papers ready to score all of the costumes. Each class got scored on creativity, design, enthusiasm and reasoning behind their costumes. The costumes were all amazing and the kids looked adorable...it was hard to make a decision.

Judges table!

Once the winners were announced everyone returned back to school/"the cancha" (court) for a never ending pica pica fight. Pica pica is what they call confetti here! Students bought or made pica pica out of little pieces of paper and the next thirty minutes were spent throwing pica pica in peoples faces and watching the cancha be rained on by the colorful pieces of confetti. Carnaval was a blast and the evidence to prove it is still all over the cancha and the school and will be for days to come.

My girls and I mid "pica-pica" fight.

Flor and I being covered in  "pica-pica"