Thanksgiving Unit

        Books:

        • The Mayflower Voyagers (Video) 1994 Paramount
        • Hiawatha
        • Squanto and the First Thanksgiving
        • The Little Indian Pottery Maker
        • Let’s Find Out About Indians
        • Red Fox and His Canoe
        • Meet the North American Indians
        • Northwest Coast Indians
        • Pueblo Indians of the Southwest
        • Indian Bunny
        • Raven
        • Alaskan Eskimos and Aleut
        • Mama Do You Love Me?
        • Squanto
        • Legend of the Indian Paint Brush
        • Many Nations
        • Twas’ The Night Before Thanksgiving
        • Mr. Turkey’s Thanksgiving
        • Over the River
        • The First Thanksgiving
        • Three Little Pilgrims
        • Cranberry Thanksgiving
        • Sam Eaton
        • Sarah Morton

        Poems and Songs:

        (click on above link to see words to poems)
        • Over the River
        • Five Fat Turkeys
        • I am a Little Indian Boy
        • Mr. Turkey
        • Ten Little Indians
        • Hello, Mr. Turkey
        • Pilgrim Boy
        • Pilgrim Girl

        Activities:

        1. Thanksgiving Feast-We make butter, cranberry muffins(to go with book, Cranberry Thanksgiving), and popcorn. We lay a long piece of bulletin board paper(for the table) in the room and we sit Indian style along the paper with another class. Some of the students dress as Pilgrims and some as Native Americans.

        2. We make Pilgrim hats.

        3. Make teepees-kids trace a cone shape, cut it out, decorate with Native American signs, and then we staple together to make a teepee.
        4. We learn to read some of the Native American signs.
        5. Indian headband-I either use real turkey feathers or the children color and cut out feathers for a headband. I use a sentence strip to make the headband. Students decorate the band with Native American signs and then we staple feathers on.
        6. We make Indian vest out of paper grocery bags. They color and also decorate with Native American signs.
        7. Maize Art-After learning about maize, we pop popcorn and the students fill an oval shape with the popcorn and then add leaves to make it look like corn (maize)

        8. Map skills- Discuss and show on map the Pilgrims’ voyage and where the different Native Americans lived.
        9. Coffee filter Turkey

        10. Paper bag turkey

        11. Oreo turkey

        12. Make canoes

        13. Make Indian Shakers
        14. Kachina Dolls and Pueblo Houses

        15. Plank houses and totem poles

        16. I bring a white deer skin for my children to see and feel when I read the book, The Legend of the Indian Paint Brush.
        17. Paper Plate Pilgrims

        18. Discuss different types of Native Americans-homes, travel
        19. Discuss Wants and Need-relates to what Pilgrims had to pack when coming to America.
        20. Long Ago/Present

        21. We use rulers and other units to measure different canoes drawn on paper.
        22. We made a class tepee out of 6 poles and a sheet. I let the children decorate the sheet with Native American signs on it.
        23. Here is a spoon turkey that a parent made with my class.

        24. We make a wigwam for the students to get in.

        25. Turkey handprint.
        26. We talk about how Squanto taught the pilgrims to plant corn.

        Letter Recognition:

        • 1. Letter Charts- Tt for teepee and Ii for Indian. Also /th/ for Thanksgiving.
        • 2. Word Family- an

        Journal:

        I am thankful for....
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