Papel Picado

Papel picado is a very popular decoration in Spanish-speaking countries. This cut-paper (literally, pierced-paper) is used for birthdays, weddings, Day of the Dead, and Cinco de Mayo, among countless other holidays and celebrations. There are a couple of different ways to make this decoration but I just used scissors with my students. It's much easier than using a chisel, for example. My after-school club had a lot of fun and so did I! I've also done this project with middle schoolers and as a high school student myself. With the younger kids, I chose easier patterns or let the students make up their own pattern. The older students are more able to successfully complete the more intricate patterns, although I could still see frustration in some of my students' eyes. This is a fun activity but can be quite difficult, depending on the pattern you choose. 

 Step 1: Start with different colored tissue paper, a variety of patterns (downloadable from the internet - here's one example), glue or a staple or tape, scissors or an exacto knife.

 Step 2: For my students, they chose one piece of tissue paper, folded it in half, and taped the pattern to one side. You can also choose multiple pieces of tissue paper and staple them together to do more at once. We used scissors in my class but you can do more intricate patterns with an exacto knife or something similar. 

Step 3: Finish cutting out the pattern. The picture to the left is one I made using a sun pattern. You have to be careful when removing the pattern otherwise you'll have to tape part of your decoration back together like I did. The picture above is an example of some that my students made without using a pattern. This method is more like making a paper snowflake and is a lot quicker and sometimes less frustrating. All in all, we had lots of fun and I'll be doing this activity a lot with my future students! Even with a whole class, it's a pretty easy activity to do. This can be used as a project for culture activities like Day of the Dead; a way to practice listening to and following directions in Spanish; vocabulary practice like colors and shapes; the possibilities are endless! You can hang up the finished products or string them together and create beautiful, long pieces of artwork to hang across the ceiling or hallway!