Работу выполнила Гета Татьяна Ученица 7а класса Учитель английского языка: Усова И.Д.

Знакомство с официальными и неофициальными праздниками Великобритании, основными обычаями и традициями данной страны. 1)Изучить информацию по теме; 2)Подобрать иллюстративный материал; 3)Оформить презентацию; 4)Защитить проектную работу;

Tanya Geta Form 7a Teacher: Usova I.D. Shlyapniki 2009

There are eight public holidays a year in Great Britain, that is days on which people need not go to work. They are: Christmas Day, Boxing Day, New Years Day, Good Friday, Easter Monday, May Day, Spring Bank Holiday and Late Summer Bank Holiday.

HolidayDateSymbols New Years DayThe 1 st of January St. Valentines Day The 14 th of February Pancake DayLast Tuesday before Lent April Fools DayThe 1 st of April Good FridayLast Friday before Easter Easter MondayIn April-May

HolidayDateSymbols May Day and May Queen Festival The 2 nd Saturday of May HalloweenThe 31 st of October Bonfire NightThe 5 th of November Christmas DayThe 25 th December Boxing DayThe 26 th December Bank HolidaysLast Monday of May and of August

New Years Day is a public holiday, often celebrated with fireworks at the stroke of midnight as the new year starts. In Britain the New Year is not as widely celebrated as Christmas. The most common type of celebration is a New Year party.

There is a funny tradition connected with the New Years morning. The First Foot mush be a man because it is believed that if woman first sets foot in the house, bad luck will follow throughout the year. He is a person who comes on purpose to let the New Year into the house and bring good luck to the family. Traditionally, the first visitor of the year must carry food and drink, a coin and a coal into the house. Coal helps to make a fire in midwinter and there shall never be lack of food and drink during the coming year. A coin means wealth.

St.Valentines Day is celebrated on February, 14 th as a festival of love. People send greeting cards called valentines to their sweethearts, friends. Many valentines have romantic poems, others are humorous. But all valentines ask Be My Valentine. Valentines often show Cupid with an arrow, he was the ancient Roman god of love. Nearly all the decorations are red and in the shape of heart. Red, pink, white are traditional colors. People like to exchange gifts on this day. The popular presents are heart shaped boxes of sweets and flowers.

Pancake Day is celebrated on Shrove Tuesday which is the day before Lent. Pancake Day is celebrated with fun, games, and of course a lot of eating. However, the most well-known activity on this day is the Pancake Day race at Olney in Buckinghamshire, England which has been held since Only women are allowed to participate in this race. They must run a designated path with a frying pan and end up at the church. They must have a hot pancake in the frying pan which they must flip at least three times before they complete the race.

April Fools' Day or All Fools' Day is a day celebrated in many countries on April 1 st. The day is marked by the practical jokes on friends, family members, enemies, and neighbors, or sending them on a fool's errand, the aim of which is to embarrass the gullible.

The word Easter comes from Easter or Eostre, the Anglo Saxon goddess of the dawn whose spring festival was celebrated in April. People believed that the sun died in winter and was born again in spring. Symbols of Easter are the cross, eggs, Easter rabbits. The cross represents Christs victory over death. Eggs symbolize new life. In English speaking countries many children believe that the Easter bunny brings Easter eggs and hides them in the garden on Easter morning. Easter is a religious holiday. People attend church for service. They exchange dyed eggs. Easter always falls in spring and is associated with new life and awakening of nature.

May Day was widely celebrated as the beginning of warm weather and natural fruition. The Romans held games in honour of the goddess of flowers, and the druids lit new fires in honour of the god Bel. Europeans celebrated May Day decorating their homes with new flowers, choosing a May Queen and dancing around a Maypole. The central figure of May Day celebrations is the May Queen, usually a schoolgirl elected by her fellows. The May Queen chooses a May King who reigns with her.

On Bank Holidays many families take a picnic-lunch or tea with them and enjoy their meal in the open air. Bank Holidays are also an occasion for big sports meetings, mainly all kinds of athletics. There are also horse races all over the country. There is also much boating activity on the Thames, regattas at Henley and on other rivers.

Halloween originated as a celebration connected with evil spirits. The word Halloween come from Hallow (saint). It was started by the Celts as a night of ghosts and witches. The Celts believed that ghosts of people visited the earth on the 31 of October. The Celts lit huge bonfires on hill tops to scare the ghosts away. Witches flying on broomsticks with black cats, ghosts, goblins and skeletons are symbols of Halloween. Pumpkin is also a symbol of Halloween. People cut horrible faces in pumpkins and put a candle inside, which shines through the eyes. Such pumpkin is called jack-o'- lantern. On this day children dress up in strange costumes and knock on their neighbors doors and cry, Trick or Treat. If you give them something sweet, a treat, they go away, if you do not, they play a trick on you.

Guy Fawkes Night goes back to the days of King James I who was vary unpopular as a Protestant. So some of the Catholics made an attempt to blow up the Houses of Parliament. The who was to explode the building was Guy Fawkes. But he was discovered, arrested and hanged. Since that time, on the 5 th of November, they burn the dummy of Guy Fawkes, made of straw, on a bonfire.

Christmas is a religious holiday. It is a day when Christians celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. It is a happy holiday. Families come together to share happiness and exchange gifts. People prepare for this holiday weeks before. They make and buy presents. They take a fur-tree and decorate it with lights and ornaments. Christmas cards are sent to friends and relatives. There are evening church services which everyone attends. In the morning people wish each other Merry Christmas They eat special traditional food: a turkey and Christmas pudding. On December, 24 th Christmas Evening children hang up stockings to receive gifts from Santa Claus. He is the main character of the holiday. He goes all around the world on his reindeer.

This is the day when one visits friends, goes for a drive or a long walk or just sits around recovering from too much food-everything to eat is cold. In the country there are usually Boxing Day Meets. Boxing Day takes its name from the old custom of giving servants and postmen a small present in a Christmas box.

When foreigners come to England, they are struck at once by a great number of customs and traditions in English life. They may seem strange to visitors but the English still keep up these old customs and traditions which mix with everyday life in the streets of busy London.

Trooping the Colour is performed on Horse Guards Parade every year on the Queens official birthday. During the month of June, a day is set aside as the Queens official birthday. This is usually the second Saturday in June. On this day there takes place on Horse Guards Parade in Whitehall the magnificent spectacle of Trooping the Colour, which begins at about 11.15a. m. The colours of one of the five regiments of Foot Guards are trooped before the Sovereign. The ceremony ends with the Queen returning to Buckingham Palace at the head of her Guards.

Traditional uniforms are still preserved in Great Britain. You can see a group of cavalrymen riding on black horses through the central streets of London. They wear red uniforms, shining helmets, long black boots and long white gloves. They carry swords. These men are Life Guards and their special duty is to guard the king or queen. In the Tower of London you can see the warders or Beefeaters with their funny flat hats.

Ceremony of the Keys takes place every night at the Tower of London, and has done so since the 14th century. At exactly 9.53 pm, the Chief Yeoman Warder, dressed in Tudor Watchcoat, meets the Military Escort, made up of members of the Tower of London Guard. Together, the CYW and the Yeoman Warder 'Watchman' secure the main gates of the Tower. Upon their return down Water Lane, the party is halted by the sentry and challenged to identify themselves: Sentry: Who comes there? Chief Warder: The keys. S: Whose keys? CW: Queen Elizabeth's keys. S: Pass Queen Elizabeth's Keys. All's well.

There is a very special royal tradition. On the river Thames there are hundreds of swans. Traditionally, a number of these beautiful large white birds belong to the Queen. In July, when the young swans are about two months the Queens swan-keeper goes up the river Thames in a boat from London Bridge to Henley to mark the royal ones. This unusual custom is called swan-upping.

The Royal Ascot is the worlds most famous race meeting, steeped in history dating back to The royal family attend the meeting, arriving each day in a horse- drawn carriage. The Royal Enclosure has a strict dress codemen must wear full morning dress including a top hat, ladies must not show bare midriffs or shoulders and must wear hats. Hats are very exotic.

Midsummers Day, June 24th is the longest day of the year. On that day a very old custom at Stonehenge in Wiltshire, England is observed. Stonehenge is one of the Europes biggest stone circles that is 10 or 12 meters high. The earliest part of Stonehenge is approximately 5000 years old. Actually the Druids priests in Britain used Stonehenge for a calendar. They introduced it about 2000 years ago. The sun and the stones at Stonehenge let the Druids know when the months and seasons start. On the morning of June 24th sun shines on one famous stone-the Heel Stone, this is the most important moment of the year for the Druids. There are Druids in Britain today, too, and every June a lot of them attend Stonehenge. It is a strange, ancient, rare but still living custom.

John Bull is a national personification of the United Kingdom in general and England in particular, originating in the creation of Dr. John Arbuthnot in Bull is usually portrayed as a stout man in a tailcoat with light coloured breeches, his waistcoat always depicts a Union Flag. He also wears a low topper on his head and is often accompanied by a bulldog.

Among other traditions that most Englishmen observe is 5 oclock tea which people can have at any time between 4 and 6p.m. It is a very light meal and the time when everything stops for tea in England and this became a kind of ritual.

The English people are great pet lovers. Practically every family has a dog or a cat, or both. They have special dog shops selling food, clothes and other things for dogs. There are dog hairdressing saloons and dog cemeteries.

Polo Boxing Rugby Golf Tennis Badminton Curling Сricket

The City of London Festival is an annual arts festival that takes place in the City of London, England, over two to three weeks in June and July. The Festival is strongly geared towards classical music, but also offers a programme that includes jazz, world music, opera, film screenings, lectures and guided tours.

Итогом моей работы над проектом стало создание компьютерной презентации по теме « Праздники и Традиции Великобритании» Написав свой проект, я узнала много интересной и полезной информации о Великобритании, и сделала вывод, что Англия действительно страна традиций. При создании компьютерной презентации немного было сложности при оформлении. Мой проект может быть использован на уроках английского языка по страноведению и во внеклассных мероприятиях.