Oak Forest High School World Language Club hosted the Day of the Dead Festivities on November 3 in a special presentation in the IMC. The Day of the Dead is known as “El Día de los Muertos” and it is over a 3,000-year-old tradition that celebrates life and death and honors those who have died.
In the celebration, the club presented a slide show and a short movie that educated all OF world language classes about el Día de los Muertos.
The World Language Club also highlighted traditional things of this cultural celebration, such as the family ofrenda, or altar. On that ofrenda, families place pictures of their loved ones food that their loved ones liked to eat, sugar skulls, marigolds, tamales and mole, a cross or a statue of the Virgin de Guadalupe, and water and salt.
This day is not a sad holiday, because, to those who celebrate, it is a happy holiday where the souls of the departed bring good luck.
After the presentations, students could visit various stations where they could get their faces painted, or they would write messages to their loved ones on the Oak Forest High School ofrenda, or altar. Students also looked at individual ofrenda that students made dedicated to loved ones.
Students enjoyed the activities and everyone learned a little about el Día de los Muertos.