Leprechauns and Luck for St. Patrick's Day

Hi there! I’m Róisín from Little Learner Toolbox and I am delighted to guest blog here on Rockin’ Teacher Materials, especially at one of my favorite times of the year. Growing up In Ireland, Saint Patrick’s Day was always such a big day, and I still get excited every time when the day comes around.

I love thinking of fun ways to celebrate Irish culture for St Patrick’s Day and one very fun part of Irish culture is our folk tales - especially the stories about Leprechauns! Leprechauns have been part of Irish folklore for over 1,000 years. They are fairy folks that come from Ireland and often look like old men, although they are never bigger than a small child. They aren’t nearly as cute and loveable as the images we often see of them would suggest. They are often grumpy and get up to quite a lot of mischief. Leprechauns are very hardworking and like to store the gold that they earn in a giant pot. Some stories even suggest that Leprechauns are misers who like to hoard their money. From what is known, leprechauns often like to store their gold at the end of a rainbow, but we can’t really be sure because people are rarely successful in capturing leprechauns. If you do happen to be lucky enough to catch one, be sure to keep your eyes on him, because as soon as you look away from a leprechaun they can escape!

There are many stories about people who tried to capture a leprechaun to find their gold. One well-known story is about a man who managed to capture a leprechaun. He made the leprechaun tell him where his gold was hidden. The leprechaun reluctantly showed him his hiding spot in a forest, underneath a tree. The man then realized that he had no tools to dig for the gold and that he would not be able to carry both the struggling leprechaun and his tools all the way back to the forest. So he took his scarf and wrapped it around the tree. He made the leprechaun promise not to remove the gold or the scarf, and then he went home to collect his tools. When he returned to the forest he found that the Leprechaun had tied scarves around every tree so it was impossible to know exactly where the gold was buried. The leprechaun laughed as he told the man that he had not removed the gold or the scarf just as he promised. That man never did find the gold he was looking for.

Certainly anyone who manages to trap a leprechaun and find his gold would be very lucky indeed! Students who want to trap leprechauns have to plan carefully! Leprechauns are very tricky! One thing that is fun to do on St Patrick’s Day is to think about some of the ways that we are ‘lucky’. What better way to do this than to fill a Leprechaun’s pot with gold coins full of things that are ‘lucky’ for us. For this activity ask your students to think about things that are important to them. Encourage them to fill their pot with things in their lives that they are lucky to have. 

   Click on the images to download the Freebie pages from my TpT store.

If you liked this St Patrick’s Day post, check out my blog post about Saint Patrick HERE. For more resources for Saint Patrick’s day visit my TpT Store Little Learner’s Toolbox.

The sample pages above are from: