Celebrations, festivals, and public holidays are popular homework topics throughout the year.
Why not visit your local library to start your homework topic on the following celebrations, festivals, and public holidays.
Try some of the saved catalogue searches below:
Auckland Anninversary Day - is celebrated on the nearest Monday to 29 January This commemorates the founding of the Auckland Province which was first observed in 1842.
- The Chinese, or Lunar, New Year is also known as the Spring Festival. It falls on the first day of the first lunar month, usually late January or February. Lion and dragon dances are very popular during the celebrations.
- 25 December is Christmas or "Christ's Mass" and is celebrated in honour of the birth of Jesus Christ. It used to be a moveable feast but the date of 25 December was set in AD 350 by Pope Julius I.
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- Celebrated in October and November, "The Festival of Lights" is a Hindu celebration for the the return of a prince to his country after fourteen years of banishment. His people celebrated by lighting lamps everywhere. Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth and prosperity, is also worshipped during this time.
- The date for celebrating Easter moves as Easter Sunday is the first Sunday after the first full moon on or following the Northern Hemisphere Spring equinox (which is very confusing!!!). Easter is the principal feast of the Christian year and commemorates the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Easter Egg (chocolate being the favourite sort) is the emblem of renewed life after death.
Father's Day - This celecration falls on the first Sunday in September. The celebration of fathers was inspired by attending a Mothers' Day service in 1909 when Mrs John Bruce Dodd wondered why fathers' didn't have a day to pay tribute to them - hence Fathers' Day
- 5 November celebrates the failure of the gunplowder plot, which attempted to blow up the House of Lords while King James I was opening a new session of parliament. Guy Fawkes was one of the men who was part of the Gunpowder Plot.
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- 31 October is Halloween, which is a contraction of Hallows-Eve, this is the day before All Hallows' Day, or All Saints' Day. This is the night where, traditionally, the spirits of the dead roamed the earth. This is the time for children to dress up and go "trick or treating."
- Hanukkah falls between 25 November and 26 December. Hanukkah, or Chanukah, the Feast of Lights commemorates the successful rebellion of the Jews against the Syrians around 165 BC, and the rededication by the Maccabees of the Temple in Jerusalem. A special Hanukkah menorah is lit, and there are special games and songs.
- This public holiday falls on the fourth Monday in October celebrating the establishment of the 8 hour working day from 1899.
- The name Matariki is given by Māori to a cluster of stars that rise on the northeastern horizon about the end of May each year.
Matariki was used by pre-European Māori to help them navigate the seas and to tell them whether the coming harvests would be plentiful. It is also a time of reflection.
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Mother's Day - This celebration falls on the second Sunday in May. Mothers' Day dates from early in the twentieth century, and follows the observance of Mothering Sunday which is the fourth Sunday in Lent. Mothers' Day began as a crusade by Anna Jarvis in 1907 to set a day aside to pay tribute to Mothers.
New Year - This public holiday is celebrated on 1 January. New Year's Day has been celebrated for centuries on many different days, but it was only in 1752 that Britain accepted 1 January as the beginning of the year. New Year's Day is significant as it symbolises a new start.
Queen's Birthday - This public holidays falls on the first Monday in June. The king or queen of Britain has two birthdays - the real day of their birth and the official Queen's (or King's) Birthday. This is so that the awarding of the Queen's (or King's) Birthday Honours happens a long time away from the New Year's Honours.
- Passover is between 27 March and 24 April, and is the "festival of freedom", a seven or eight-day celebration of the deliverance of the Jews from slavery in Egypt more than 3000 years ago.
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- This religious celebration falls in the ninth month of the Islamic Calendar (a moveable date). This is the holiest time in the Islamic year as it commemorates the time when the Koran (or Qu'ran) was revealed to Muhammed. During this month Muslims must fast during the hours of daylight, that is they can't eat or drink. Some people don't have to, like young children, the very old and the sick.
- This celebration falls on 17 March. The feast day of the patron saint of Ireland, St Patrick, who was born around AD 385 and died around AD 461. This is the day celebrated by "the wearing of the green" when people of Irish descent celebrate their heritage.
- Valentine's Day is on the 14 February. An ancient springtime festival of love and romance , once part of the Roman festival Lupercalia, that is now named after a Christian Saint, Valentine, who was beheaded in AD 269.
- celebrated on February 6 each year, this is New Zealand's national day and it is named after the site of the first signing of what we know today as the Treaty of Waitangi.
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