TRADITIONS
Mexico has so many different beautiful traditions that we couldn’t cover them all!
So there are some exercises about art, some about food, some about sport and some about festivals - a little bit of everything!
Activity 13: Kahlo & Rivera
Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera were two very famous Mexican painters. They were married but they painted in different ways, using different styles and about different things.
There are 2 artistic activities in this section, so you’ll need some art supplies like paper, colouring pencils, maybe even some paints if you’re feeling adventurous!
Draw like Diego Rivera
Diego Rivera was famous as a muralist, which means he painted huge paintings, usually on walls.
His paintings had lots of different things happening in them, rather than focusing on just one thing. Lots of his paintings include hundreds of people, all doing different things.
Some of his famous paintings were of the history of Mexico with almost every single famous person from the history of Mexico in one single big painting.
La Calavera Catrina is from a Rivera mural.
She’s a skeleton dressed up like a rich, European lady.
Find a big piece of paper. You can always stick two pieces of paper together.
Draw all the people you know in your life on the paper. They can be doing all sorts of different things. Make sure to fill the whole page, so there’s hardly any white space left.
(Even though Diego drew on the walls, don’t do that! You’d get in trouble and so would we!)
Here’s a Diego Rivera painting…
You can see some more of Diego Rivera’s paintings here, if you click on this button…
What is Frida thinking?
Frida was in an accident when she was 18, so she spent a lot of time in bed.
She arranged her paints so that she could paint while lying down, and did some amazing work despite being in lots of pain.
Frida did smaller paintings than Diego, with fewer things. She would often draw herself, which is called a self-portrait. She was known for having big, dark eyebrows which met in the middle.
Sometimes in her self portraits, Frida would draw what she was thinking about on her forehead in a little circle.
This was a way of showing what was on her mind when she painted.
Can you draw what you imagine she’s thinking about? You might want to do some more research about her before you start.
Click on the picture to download a copy and print it
Frida and Diego lived in a very special house, which means ‘The Blue House’ in English (because it was painted blue), but what was the name of Frida’s house in Spanish? La _ _ _ _ / _ _ _ _ ⭐
Here’s a picture of the inside…
Activity 14: Fútbol
Lots of different sports are played in Mexico, like basketball, boxing and even bullfighting.
The most popular sport is football, which is called fútbol in Spanish.
This activity is a maths exercise.
Find out how the ball moves across the pitch and what the final answer is.
Start at the goalkeeper with jersey number 1. You need to solve the maths question underneath his football jersey. It’s 8+3.
The jersey with the correct answer on it is who the ball goes to next. Solve the maths question underneath that one, and pass the ball onto the next player. Continue the pattern until you reach the question mark. The answer that goes there is the answer to the puzzle.
And Mexico wins!!!!!
The answer is _ _ _ _ ⭐
Activity 15: Time to eat!
Mexican food developed over thousands of years and is very popular and delicious.
Lots of recipes are made with traditional Mexican ingredients like avocados, cocoa, vanilla and maize, which is made into corn tortillas.
You’re going out for some Mexican food but you don’t have much money. Don’t worry, you just need to work out how much things will cost first!
Can you answer these questions?
How much does it cost when you order Mexican Punch, Tacos and rice pudding?
You want to only spend 9 pesos, but you want to have something to drink, a starter, a main and a dessert. What can you order
What is the most expensive thing on the menu? ⭐
Activity 16: Los Luchadores
Mexican wrestling or Lucha Libre is a special style of wrestling. Wrestlers are called luchadores and they wear special masks when they wrestle.
The masks are very colourful and each wrestler has his own pattern. Masks are very important in Lucha Libre, and some luchadores never take them off in public.
If you lose a wrestling match, you might have your mask taken away from you, and never be able to wear it again. This is very embarassing.
Here are some (fictional) luchador masks, with the names of the wrestlers underneath.
The Masked Nightmare
The Bullet
El Tigre
The Destroyer
Mil Mascaras
This is a muddled up version of a luchadores’ mask, but whose mask is it supposed to be? ⭐
Activity 17: Alebrijes
Alebrijes are statues made of wire and papier mache. They are colourful and look a bit like regular animals but with extra things, like wings or webbed feet or breathing fire.
The man who invented them got sick and had a dream with loads of strange animals which had extra parts like wings. In his dream they kept shouting '“alebrijes! alebrijes!”. When he woke up he started to make statues of them. Now they are very famous. You can learn more about this story in this video…
The alebrije below needs to be coloured in, but the names of the colours are in Spanish.
Can you translate the colours and colour the alebrije to look right?
(Remember you can click on the image to download and colour in a version of the alebrije)
What colour is the body of the alebrije in English? ⭐
Activity 18: Dia de Muertos
Dia de Muertos (Day of the Dead) is an important celebration in Mexico. It happens on the 1st and 2nd of November.
Although it happens at the same time as Halloween, it’s completely different. Dia de Muertos is about celebrating the lives of family members who have died. It’s the only day when the spirits of the dead can come visit their relatives.
