I AM THANKFUL FOR...YOU!!

Thanksgiving is drawing near and I can think of so many things I am thankful for! One of them being you! Thank you for reading our blog and sharing our blog! I means the world to all of us! 

 I am sure you can think of several things that you are thankful for as well! But, how would you narrow it down to just one thing if you had to?

That is what I have asked my kindergartners to do…come up with the one thing that you are MOST thankful for and we use it to make a special placemat that they can use on Thanksgiving Day at home. We do this project over the course of a week. 

I start by asking my students what Thanksgiving means to them? Why do we celebrate Thanksgiving? What does “give thanks” mean?

Then I read the book Thanksgiving is for Giving Thanks written by Margaret Sutherland. I then go back and ask the same questions I asked before to see if students may have changed their minds. 

We then talk about the things that we are thankful for. Some students share many things they are thankful for and others may only share one thing.

I make a predictable chart, “I am thankful for __________.”  I tell students that I know that they are thankful for many things and so am I, but I want them to think of the one thing that they are MOST thankful for. Then, one by one, students will tell me what they are thankful for and then come up and help me finish writing the sentence. It is nice when there is more than one adult in the room because then you can split the class into two or three groups to do this part and it won’t take as long. 

Once all of the students have been able to tell me what they are thankful for, the students will come up and read their sentence with the special Fall pointer, being sure to point to each word as they read it. 

Next, I will write out the sentences on small strips of paper and hand them out to the students. Students will read their sentences at their seats. Once they have done this, students will then cut out the words in the sentence and the period. When the words are all cut out, they will mix up the words and then put them back together in the correct order 2-3 times. I make sure that students leave a finger space between each word and they must read it to me one time after they have put their sentence back in the correct order.

Students then will glue their sentence on a white piece of paper and illustrate. I have also had students write out their sentences instead of gluing them on.

Once students are done illustrating, they will take their work and glue it onto an orange or brown piece of construction paper. I will then give them time to dry and laminate them so that we can use them for our Kindergarten Feast at school and then students can take them home and use them for Thanksgiving Dinner with their family. They can also help in saying the prayer before dinner by reading their place mat. 

I hope you have wonderful Thanksgiving, spend it well with family! 

Carie is a kindergarten teacher from Illinois who writes on the 17th of each month. She shares her experiences and ideas from her classroom, writing about reading, writing, math, Art, and several other fun and exciting things!

Carie also writes her own blog: 

Kindergarten Hugs

Carie Ramirez