Argentine children have a special day just for them every year: Día de las Infancias, also known as Día de las Niñeces, is celebrated on the third Sunday of August to cherish childhood in all its shapes and forms.

The celebration dates back to 1960. After adopting the Declaration of the Rights of the Child in 1959, the United Nations Organization (UN) recommended that each country establish a day to promote children’s welfare through cultural and social activities. The declaration was adopted by countries all over the world in 1989. Argentina ratified the Convention in 1990, and it was given constitutional status when the National Constitution was reformed in 1994.

It’s a day in which children are encouraged to play and enjoy themselves with friends and family, but also a day to raise awareness of their rights. In the days prior to the celebration, elementary schools teach them about the main points of the UN’s Convention on the Rights of the Child. 

The Argentine Chamber of the Toy Industry says that the origin of the celebration in the country goes all the way back to 1945, when toy makers started collecting donations for hospitals, schools, and orphanages every year at the beginning of August.

The first official Día del Niño was celebrated on the first Sunday of August in 1960, and the tradition went on until 2003, when the Chamber of the Toy Industry asked for the date to be changed to the second Sunday of August. In 2011 the date coincided with the country’s mandatory primary elections and had to be moved to the following Sunday. So, in 2013, the celebration was moved to the third Sunday of the month, and has remained the same ever since.

In 2020, the National Childhood, Adolescence and Family Secretariat officially changed the name of the celebration from Día del Niño — which uses the masculine form niño (boy) to refer to all children — to the gender-neutral Día de las Infancias (Childhood Day, in English), with the intention of representing diversity in childhood.

“It’s very important for the state to support cultural transformations and promote change to help raise awareness on inequity, and benefit inclusion,” Childhood Secretary Gabriel Lerner said in 2020. “Saying niño is not enough to represent all the different experiences in childhood.”

Día de las Infancias is also a big commercial day, comparable to Christmas and Three Kings Day. Julián Benítez, Institutional Relations Manager to the Chamber of the Toy Industry, told Télam radio that more than 60% of the annual toy sales happen on Childhood Day.

If you and your little ones are in Argentina for Día de las Infancias, there are a lot of cultural activities to enjoy — and many of them are free of charge.

Usina del Arte, a historical cultural center located in the Buenos Aires city neighborhood of La Boca, offers free music, puppet, and theater shows for children this weekend. There are also tours inside the building as well as cooking and artistic workshops. You can check out all the activities here.

Museums all over Buenos Aires city will also offer activities for children. The Sívori, Saavedra, and Gardel museums, as well as the Cinema Museum (Museo del Cine) and Museum of Buenos Aires are offering special kid-friendly programs on Sunday. You can check them out here — you will have to fill out a form for the chosen activity and pay admission to the museum, but not the event.