Why skeletons for day of the dead

I like to use 9" x18" papers and encourage students to fill the paper with their skeletons. Students start by making a skull from white construction paper and glueing it near the top of their papers. All bones are made by flattening white paper straws. Have students start the skeleton with a backbone, then add a collarbone, hip bones, and ribs. Younger students can make simpler skeletons.

Next, have students measure and cut two bones each for arm and leg bones. Ask them to add bent knees and elbows to provide more interest and a suggestion of movement.

Finally, students can decorate their skeletons and give them personality, using different kinds of paper and decorative items. I encouraged them to leave some of the ribcage showing, so it definitely looked like a skeleton.

Students can also decorate the backgrounds of their skeletons. For older students, you may want to have them make their skulls out of white, flattened Model Magic. One individual package each is the perfect amount for students.

Details can be added to these with markers and by embedding items such as sequins, buttons, and the like. Have students make the skulls separately and glue them on the background paper only when they are complete.

The skull pictured here has a background of perforated paper, called paper picado. Skulls can also be used in other ways. Personality Quizzes. Funny Fill-In. Amazing Animals. Weird But True! Party Animals. Try This! Explore More. Skeletons are scary, right? An altar shows some of a relative's favorite items. There is a long tradition of art depicting skeletons in Mexico.

Calaveras means skulls and by extension of course skeletons. Dia De Los Muertos is not celebrated on Halloween and it is not tied to this now secular day of trick or treating. Xyuandbeyond is reader-supported. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.

As an Airbnb Associate, I earn a small commission if you book through one of my links. You can read my privacy policy here. All over Mexico, people paint their faces as incredibly beautiful skulls to celebrate the Day of the Dead.

The skull face paint represents their ancestors who have passed on and celebrates the beauty and necessity of death. La Catrina is the name used by the women of Mexico when they paint their faces to resemble skulls.

In the late s and early s, Jose Guadalupe Posada began creating engraving and etchings to illustrate the newspapers of the day called broadsheets. His prints of skeletons doing everyday jobs are still called Calaveras today. Of course, the Calaveras were usually the servant girl wearing cast-off clothes.

Calavera etchings were generally of women because in Mexico death is portrayed as a woman la Muerte. The mural portrays over years of Mexican history and it includes Posada, Frida Kahlo and himself. La Catrina has been given a body and a very expensive outfit; it is believed Rivera depicted Calavera this way to indicate that death applies to all of us including the rich.

So the Catrina was used to symbolize the differences between the upper and lower classes. The thought is that we are all really just a bag of bones beneath our fancy clothes and that the rich have nothing on the rest of us.

In societal terms, it was also a new way of looking at class and wealth within a society that was rapidly changing.

These days La Catrina has come to represent the Day of the Dead and the images of her and other skeletons are now an art form in Mexico. Calavera in Mexico can mean one of three things. During Los Dias de Los Muertos you will see a huge variety of edible sugar skulls. These were made originally from sugar and now can be found in anything sweet from chocolate to decorated cookies.