This is where the Indian playgroup truly outshines its foreign cousin, because we are blessed with a festival for nearly every fortnight. Festivals give the year a shape children can feel, anchor learning in something the whole family already celebrates, and — handled with a little care — teach the deepest lesson of all: that India holds many ways of celebrating, and all of them belong.
Diwali
Spread newspaper and give each child a plain clay diya to paint with glitter and non-toxic acrylics, finished with a tea-light. For rangoli, hand out coloured rangoli powder or simply coloured rice and let them sprinkle it onto a sticky-paper outline of a flower or a peacock. Light, colour and pattern — and a diya to carry proudly home.
Raksha Bandhan
Cut cardboard circles; let children glue on sequins, glitter and fabric scraps; punch a hole and thread red and yellow wool. A home-made rakhi for a brother, a cousin, a friend — or for the playgroup itself.
Dussehra / Navratri
Make a simple Ravana mask on a paper plate, with ten little paper-cone or tissue ‘heads’ stuck on like a crown. Tell the story simply, dance a few steps of garba, and let the masks become the whole afternoon’s drama.
Holi & Basant Panchami
For Basant Panchami, make everything yellow — yellow paper flowers, yellow clothes, yellow sheera to eat. For Holi, do not use real wet colours indoors with little ones; instead, let them ‘colour’ paper cut-outs of elephants and peacocks with dry rangoli powder or coloured atta. The joy is in the colour, not the chaos.
Republic Day & Independence Day
A tiranga party: orange, white and green. Carrot or orange-segment ‘kesari’, white paneer cubes, and a green-chutney or palak layer make a tricolour snack. Or build a paper flag, or a chawal-dal-palak tricolour collage (lovely to look at, not to eat).
And everyone else’s festivals too
Make room, gladly, for Eid (decorate paper crescents and stars, share sevaiyan), Christmas (a paper-chain or a cotton-wool ‘star’), Pongal and Lohri (the harvest, the bonfire, the sugarcane), Onam (a small pookalam of fresh petals), Gurpurab, Buddha Purnima. A child who grows up making a friend’s festival as cheerfully as her own has learned something no worksheet can teach.
NCF-FS Connect
Festivals are aesthetic and cultural development at its richest, and they root children in India’s living heritage — a value NEP 2020 and NCF-FS place at the centre. Celebrating one’s own festival builds identity and belonging (socio-emotional).
Celebrating everyone’s festivals delivers the framework’s strong commitment to inclusion, diversity and respect for all communities. The making — diyas, rakhis, masks, rangoli — also carries fine-motor and creative goals along with it.
About the authors
Rewati Raman Vishewar
M.Ed. (ECCE) & MBA, pursuing a Ph.D. in the Sociology of Childhood. His ECCE research with the Square Panda Foundation was submitted to the Ministry of Women & Child Development; his Bihar ICDS curriculum review was accepted at Ambedkar University Delhi. Two decades across premium, company-owned and chain preschools.
Abhidha Seth
Gold-medal M.Sc. (Child Development) and Assistant Professor; former Head of the Delhi Government Preschool Project. Has worked with NCERT, Ambedkar University Delhi, CECED and MS University Baroda, and set up premium preschools across Delhi NCR, Bengaluru, Pune and Mumbai.
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