Explore the Festival of Colors with Holi Activities
Holi, also known as the Festival of Colors, is a Hindu festival that celebrates love, spring, and the triumph of good over evil. To help your students welcome spring and learn more about this cultural event, we’ve curated a group of resources to make it easier to add Holi activities to your ELA and social studies lessons:
Explore Holi activities
Use informational texts to teach students about the Hindu festival of colors, symbolism, and spring:
Read an article to discover the meaning and significance of the many colors used during Holi festivals in India.
Learn about symbolism and why we associate colors with different holidays, not just Holi.
Practice the reading skills of developing and identifying the central idea in an article or piece of literature by completing the central idea notetaker worksheet while using these resources.
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Discover Holi history and traditions
Explore the traditional Hindu festival that commemorates the victory of Vishnu over Hiranyakashipu and build students’ background knowledge of the holiday:
Read about the history and legends of the demon king, Hiranyakashipu, and how the celebrations that take place over the two days of the Holi festival honor his defeat.
Discover the significance of the annual painted Elephant Parade in India and how it celebrates the triumph of good over evil.
Learn why people wear, decorate with, and celebrate with different colors during the holiday, and the significance of each one in the context of Hindu traditions.
Add more skills practice to your Holi activities
Now, with just a search you can add additional skills practice to any Newsela lesson! Our updated skills search filter for Newsela ELA lets you select which skills you want to teach in the classroom and find articles that match! Plus, with skill labels on each article, you get an overview of which ones fit your lesson best, right from the search page. Ready to give it a try? Log into your Newsela account to see how it works!