Technolandy

Day 41 (of 2024/25) #halloween🎃 can be hard – thanks to @OBanerji for a great article on this!

Yeah yeah – costumes and candy. But also pressure around costumes and embracing things that are scary. It’s not for everyone. It’s easy to dismiss some legitimate concerns because of “fun”

It’s why I usually stick with literary characters (Arthur Dent and Paperbag Princess/principal being some favourites) though I also like the ones that are play-on-words. 

But we do need to be mindful in school that it ain’t for everyone… for instance if someone comes dressed for Diwali (observed on the same day this year) is that a ‘costume’?

When people wear problematic costumes because of past histories … do we call it out? My biggest change in mind for this has been pirates – I loved talked like a pirate day and Dave Burgess Teach Like A Pirate… but 🏴‍☠️ pirate actions are really violent and brutal – is everything fair game (including altering skin pigments) or do we need to be mindful and reflect and share why some reflections and dress ups, while fun are also a bit iffy. 

And even the ‘simple’ thing of dressing up can be tough – still reflect on a boy in a kindergarten class who had never really experienced being around other kids let alone an event like all hallows Eve. And while we did a great job pre teaching why he would come to school dressed as a lion… it got missed that everyone else would also be in different outfits. Didn’t go well and a new lesson was learned. And that doesn’t count the peer pressure put on kids who don’t/wont/can’t dress in costumes. There’s a reason why many stay home this day. Correction: there are MANY reasons to avoid this school day. 

• pressure for costume (price; homemade vs store bought; realism)
• Parades
• Costume contests
• Halloween dances
• Candy/allergy alerts
• “Having” to watch scary shows that you may not be ready for…
• Costumes that start out great get hot and itchy really fast – and don’t get me started on makeup
• Wearing black (though banned in many schools already because of depression…. Yeah… I’ll leave that one parked for now…) can make it tricky to be visible when cars et al are out and about – even more so when it is foggy or rainy….
• People purposefully trying to scare others…

But – even when schools take on the consideration of leaving All Hallows Eve for ‘out of school’ – there is significant pushback (even my own pointing out other things through the year have gotten the ‘but its fun for the kids’ responses…) as schools become more aware of religious overlaps…  or adapting it to ‘dress as a literary character day’… or dress up, but not as anything scary…or military (I do ban guns and weapons, please and thank you) themes, or too sexy (very ambiguous) but no masks… or makeup…  Or being worried something is going to get damaged… 

With a common shift to a “Fall Festival” – but much like our “Winter Concerts” it is a thinly veiled covering of Halloween and Christmas celebrations… a rose by any other name would smell sweet. But when kids start opting to stay home… is this moving away from the Inclusion Mindsets we are promoting in the first half of the 21st century?  – but as Edweek.org shared… there is pushback: https://www.edweek.org/leadership/spooked-by-halloween-some-schools-ban-costumes-but-not-without-pushback/2024/10 because mean old schools are taking away fun things…