Christmas In Other Lands: Pan de Pascua

I am happy to participate in MKB Christmas in Different Lands this year. The main topic this year is a favorite Christmas recipe. 

Chile has several food traditions around the Holidays and all of them are yummy. My favorite one is Pan de Pascua. 

People in Chile celebrate Christmas eve (Nochebuena) on December 24th and Christmas day (Navidad) on December 25th. Children open the presents on Christmas Day, a few minutes after 12am. People greet each other saying  Feliz Navidad or Feliz Pascua for Merry Christmas. Although Pascua means Easter, people use this word during Easter and Christmas time. I know, it is different. In any event, we have Pan de Pascua for Navidad. Just to give you an idea, Pan de Pascua is similar to Panettone or Fruit Cake. 

I can't take all the credits for this post since the recipe is not mine, the last time I made Pan de Pascua I took the recipe from En Mi Cocina Hoy, which is a bilingual blog about Chilean food. 

I loved the way they tasted and I made enough to give them as  present for my dear friends and neighbors. 

If the recipe doesn't turn out the way you want, you can always get pre-made Pan de Pascua from this store here in the USA, but you know homemade recipes are better, right? 

Welcome to our fourth annual Christmas in Different Lands series! This year each participating blogger will focus on a different country, sharing a traditional dish and more about Christmas in that country. For even more glimpses of global Christmas celebrations, see our series from previous years (2013, 2014, and 2015), plus follow our Christmas board on Pinterest! Follow Multicultural Kid Blogs's board Christmas Around the World on Pinterest.

December 2 Multicultural Baby on Multicultural Kid Blogs: Japan - Strawberry Christmas Cake

December 5 Crafty Moms Share: Nigeria - Jollof Rice

December 7 English Wife Indian Life: India - Christmas Plum Cake

December 8 Living Ideas: Indonesia - Tumpeng nasi kuning

December 9 Creative World of Varya: Lebanon 

December 12 Hanna Cheda on Multicultural Kid Blogs: Poland - How to Make Polish Gingerbread Cookies

December 13 the piri-piri lexicon: Portugal - Sonhos

December 14 Raising a Trilingual Child: Italy - Diverse Traditions

December 15 Let the Journey Begin: Latvia - Pīrāgi Spanglish Monkey: Spain - Polvorones

December 16 Pack-n-Go Girls: Austria - Vanillekipferl

December 19 Mom Hats and More : USA 

December 20 Multicultural Baby: Paraguay

December 21 La Clase de Sra. DuFault: Chile

December 22 Uno Zwei Tutu on Multicultural Kid Blogs: Colombia Discovering the World Through My Son's Eyes: Puerto Rico

December 23 All Done Monkey: Haiti

Don't miss our other posts about Christmas in different lands, plus our printable pack Celebrate Christmas Around the World, on sale now!

El milagro de la primera flor de Nochebuena

We all see beautiful poinsettias all over during Christmas time, but not everyone knows where this tradition comes from. This is why I wanted to introduce the book El Milagro de la primera flor de Nochebuena to my class. 

During our reading comprehension block, my students have been learning about Literary Elements, such as, characters, setting, problem, solution, beginning, middle and end. This book was perfect to review these elements, and also to introduce Christmas tradition's season. 

In addition to Literary Elements, we also reviewed some basic parts of a book, such as, cover, back, tittle, author and illustrator. We still need to work on nonfiction books!

Key vocabulary

Characters - Personajes

Setting - Lugar/ escenario

Problem - Problema

Solution - Solución

Beginning - Inicio

Middle - Parte media/desarrollo

End - Final

As a closing activity, my class was able to create their own Poinsettias. I took the pattern from this website, if you are interested. I just used red and green construction paper to create the flowers and a few yellow squares in the middle.