Funny Bones
Posada and His Day of the Dead Calaveras
Duncan Tonatiuh
Duncan Tonatiuh (toh-nah-tyou) is an award winning author and illustrator. Duncan was born in Mexico City and grew up in San Miguel de Allende. He graduated from Parsons The New School for Design and from Eugene Lang College in New York City in 2008. His work is inspired by Ancient Mexican art, particularly that of the Mixtec codex. His aim is to create images that honor the past, but that address contemporary issues that affect people of Mexican origin on both sides of the border
"Talking Notes"
- State CHAMPS expectation and introduce the book
- "How many of you have celebrated the Day of the Dead?"
- "Why do you think the Day of the Dead is celebrated?"
- Ask students if they have ever seen a Calavera
- "Do you think Calaveras have a deep meaning?"
- Read pages 2 -3 to class
- Pause and ask students if they remember what a calavera is
- Go back and read the sentence that has the word "strumming"
- Ask students to put a thumbs up if they know what strumming is
- Ask students to act out with hand motions what they think strumming looks like
- Explain that strumming is how you brush the guitar strings in order to make the guitar sound
- Continue reading to page 8
- "Why did Posada have to move to a new city? Do you think his family was in danger?"
- Read up to page 12 and introduce the word intriguing
- Ask students to echo me "Intriguing means interesting or fascinating"
- Ask students to look to their shoulder partner and come up with a gesture or movement that their partner might find to be intriguing/interesting/fascinating
- Continue reading until page 17 and ask students what they liked about the poem
- "Who can point out the rhyming words in this poem? Who can tell me the joke in the poem?"
- Read up to page 21 and allow students to share their final thoughts of Don Lupe's Day of the Dead Calaveras meaning
- "What is your opinion? Is the Day of the Dead a celebration of death or life?"
- Review the two vocabulary words.
- Have students show me what strumming is and have students share with their partners what intriguing means
Multicultural Read Aloud for 5th grade
- The book demonstrates unique language (there are Spanish words located all throughout the book)
- The book honors and celebrates diversity (on pages 2, 14, 16, 20 it talks about the Day of the Dead)
- The book includes members of a minority group for a purpose other than filing a quota (the book talks about the life of a Mexican artist, Jose Guadalupe Posada)
Day of the Dead History
Day of the Dead is an interesting holiday celebrated in central and southern Mexico during the chilly days of November 1 & 2. People believe that the gates of heaven are opened at midnight on October 31st, and the spirits of all deceased children are allowed to reunite with their families for 24 hours. On November 2nd, the spirits of adults come down to enjoy the festivities that are prepared for them.
Calaveras aka Sugar Skulls
- Sugar skulls represented a departed soul, had the name written on the forehead and was placed on the home "ofrenda" or gravestone to honor the return of a particular spirit. Sugar skull art reflects the folk art style of big happy smiles, colorful icing and sparkly tin and glittery adornments.
Reflection
- This book was selected because majority of my class comes from an Hispanic-Spanish speaking household. The class had previously made calaveras for an art project, but they learned a lot more fact and history based on the text.
- The strength of the read aloud came when I read the Spanish words to the class. They immediately got excited and they couldn't believe that I knew Spanish so it made them be 100% engaged the entire time. The fact that I was able to engage them that fast, made participation during the dramatization of the vocabulary words easier than expected.
- What I would like to do differently next time is already have the classroom setup before the read aloud. The students had to help me rearrange desk in order to have everyone set at the carpet.
- Implementing multicultural children's literature that is culturally and linguistically diverse relative to my elementary students has helped me bond with the children of all backgrounds, made them more excited about reading, and helped them learn facts of other cultures.