This is a description of how Easter is celebrated in England.

1. Easter
In England

2. Origins
• Easter, like many modern festivals in the UK,
was originally a religious festival. Nowadays,
however, many people take part who aren’t
usually religious.
• At Easter Christians celebrate when Jesus was
crucified and rose again, and some people
consider it the most important Christian
festival.

3. Days of Easter
• Easter begins with ‘shrove Tuesday,’ more
commonly known as ‘pancake day.’
People used to eat all the rich food they
had left before Lent, which was a period of
fasting.
• In England today, some people still follow
Lent by giving up something they enjoy
(eg. sweets or chocolate.)
• As children we were told that it teaches
you to be more thankful and to think

4. •Pancake day is celebrated
by a lot of people in
England.
•We eat lots of pancakes,
usually for either breakfast
or tea, and traditionally with
lemon juice and sugar but
often with nutella, fruit, ice
cream or other sweet things
•It is followed by ‘Ash
Wednesday’ when we went
to church and were marked
with ash on our foreheads.
This marks the beginning of
Lent.

5. • Lent lasts for 40 days,
and ends with Holy
Week. The weekend
before Easter is Palm
Sunday, when we went
to church and everyone
had a small cross made
from palm leaves.
• The last 3 days before
are Maundy Thursday,
Good Friday (when you
can’t eat meat, only
fish) and Easter
Saturday.

6. • On Easter Sunday is
when Jesus rose from
the dead and when the
children are allowed to
open any Easter eggs or
other Easter chocolate
they have received
(after attending church,
of course!)
• In England Good Friday
and Easter Monday (the
day after Easter) are
both bank holidays.

7. Easter Symbols
• Eggs and chicks (baby chickens) at Easter
symbolise new life.
• Many eggs at the moment are produced by big
chocolate companies.

8. • Lambs (baby sheep) at
this time symbolize the
Lamb of God (ie.
Jesus.) Due to the
time of year they can
be seen in the
countryside.
• Similarly rabbits and
hares are also signs of
spring and new life,
often used as Easter
symbols.

9. • The Easter Bunny
(another word for
rabbit, often used when
talking to small
children) has become
very popular in the
USA, and is known but
not very common in the
UK too.
• It is a character a little
like Santa Claus who
comes to give children
chocolate eggs.

10. • Hot cross buns also
symbolise Easter (and
spring in general) to me.
They are small, sweet
buns of bread with
raisins inside and a cross
of icing on top to remind
us of Jesus' crucifixion.
(And they’re very tasty!)
• Daffodils are also a sign
of this time of year, and
can often be seen in
England.

11. Modern Traditions
• In my primary school,
one of the main events
of Easter was the Easter
egg raffle. Each child
brought at least one
Easter egg into school,
and we all sat in the hall
and had a raffle. If you
were lucky you could
win two or even three
eggs!

12. • It is also fairly common to have an Easter egg
hunt. Parents hide small chocolate eggs
around the house or garden and the children
have to find them all.

13. Do you have any questions?