Teaching Ideas for Thanksgiving

Celebrate Thanksgiving with this comprehensive collection of classroom activities, all organised into different subject areas.

If you have any other suggestions, let us know in the comments at the bottom of the page.

English:

• Write a thank-you letter to someone in the school community.
• Create acrostic poems using the word “THANKFUL” or “HARVEST”.
• Try our teaching ideas for the book The Hare That Wouldn’t Share.
• Watch this video about the presidential tradition of pardoning the turkey, then write a report about the tradition.

• Try one of these writing prompts, all based around Thanksgiving.
• Write a recipe for a traditional Thanksgiving food, such as mashed potatoes, using imperative verbs and sequencing.
• Use a thesaurus to make a list of synonyms for words associated with Thanksgiving, such as “thankful” and “kind”.
• Find an image of a Thanksgiving meal, such as this one, and use it as a stimulus for writing a story setting.
• Create a comic strip about a story set at Thanksgiving.
• Create some character profiles and use speech bubbles to show what they are thankful for. Change their words to direct or indirect speech.
• Write a report about a harvest festival.
• Create a word wall of Thanksgiving vocabulary.
• Write a short play about sharing and kindness.
• Read a book on the theme of being thankful, such as Thank You, Mr Panda. This page also has a list of books you could use.

Maths:

• Measure ingredients for a Thanksgiving recipe.
• Conduct a class survey and create a bar graph of favourite autumn and Thanksgiving foods.
• Create a shopping list for a Thanksgiving feast and calculate the total cost or cost per person.

Science:

• Go outside and look for signs of autumn, such as leaves changing colour.
• Create food chains using autumn crops such as nuts.
• Try out some chromatography with autumn leaves.
• Watch this video about the life cycle of a pumpkin.

• Try some seasonal and Thanksgiving foods. What do they taste like?
• Find out which animals near you are migrating and where they are coming from or going to. Mark these on a map.

Computing:

• Create a digital thank-you card.
• Try one of these fun Thanksgiving games.
• Design a Thanksgiving quiz.
• Create a slideshow about seasonal foods.
• Interview people about what they are thankful for. Record the interviews and create a short video.
• Create a blog post or podcast episode about Thanksgiving.

Design Technology:

• Create a pop-up Thanksgiving card.
• Build a table centrepiece using recycled and natural materials.
• Create a Thanksgiving menu.
• Design a float or balloon for the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.

Art:

• Try one of these great craft ideas from The Woodland Trust, including leaf animals and leaf rubbings.
• Paint an autumn or harvest landscape.
• Look at some famous paintings associated with Thanksgiving, such as Norman Rockwell’s Freedom from Want. This page has lots of other ideas.
• Create a cornucopia from clay or follow this step-by-step drawing tutorial.

• Design a Thanksgiving bookmark.

Music:

• Learn and perform a harvest song like this one:

• Create a rap about gratitude.
• Listen to classical music associated with autumn, such as Autumn from The Four Seasons by Vivaldi.

Geography:

• Try this fun idea that uses pumpkins to reach longitude and latitude.
• Use this BBC Bitesize page to learn about food around the world.
• Create a poster about Thanksgiving traditions in the USA.
• Compare USA and Canadian Thanksgiving traditions.

History:

• Download our Thanksgiving Pack for a wealth of resources, including a comprehensive guide.

• Find out about the first Thanksgiving.

• This page has lots of ideas for different age groups, and this one has ideas for younger children.
• Discuss this image from 1858. What does it tell us about Thanksgiving at that time?
• Watch this video with older children and discuss the different viewpoints about Thanksgiving.

• Write a history of Black Friday. This BBC page has lots of useful information.
• Research and create a timeline of different farming tools. Scroll down on this page for some useful facts.
• Make a list of ways that we preserve food, such as freezing etc. How was food preserved in the past? This Kids Britannica page has some useful information.
• Investigate the origins of the cornucopia with the information on this Kiddle page.
• Create a diary entry from someone involved in the first Thanksgiving.

Physical Education:

• Play Turkey Trot.
• Try some of these Thanksgiving PE ideas.

Religious Education

• Compare harvest-related festivals such as Sukkot (Judaism), Pongal (Hinduism), and Harvest Festival (Christianity) . What are the similarities and differences?
• Read and discuss religious stories that promote sharing, kindness, or gratitude. This page has some great examples from Christianity. The story of Sudama and Krishna is another good text to use for this.
• Make a list of religious rituals that involve giving thanks (e.g. prayers, offerings, songs).
• Create a gratitude prayer or reflection.

Languages:

• Create a multilingual poster showing the word “thank you” in different languages.
• Write a thank-you message or card in a language you are studying.
• Collect vocabulary about autumn in the language you are studying.
• Learn and perform a simple harvest or gratitude song in another language, like this one.

PSHE:

• Discuss what it means to be thankful and how we show appreciation in daily life
• Have a discussion about how it feels to be thankful and how it feels to be thanked.
• Create a gratitude journal or wall where students add their thoughts.