1-2-3 Come Do Some Turkey Activities With Me

Studying a bit about turkeys is not only super-interesting, but it helps me get in some science and non-fiction practice as well.

Turkeys are a perfect November theme, without being totally tied to Thanksgiving, which is not celebrated by everyone in our very diverse classrooms of today.

With these things in mind, I designed “Turkey Talk”. It’s chock full of a variety of activities that include:

* A colorful KWL chart which can be done as a whole group, while the BW version can be done individually.

* 4 realistic and lovely clip art posters featuring a male, female and baby turkey along with a nest of eggs.
* I’ve also included a set of “Match Game” picture and word cards.

* A “color me” Turkey Talk emergent reader, that’s packed with Dolch sight words, as well as a “trace & write” version for younger kiddos.

* A “Let’s Talk Turkey” vocabulary building poster, with a matching...
* “Define These Words” worksheet.
* A “Turkey Time” word search as a fun way to practice these new words.
* A labeled turkey head, photo-poster, with an accompanying definition one, plus
* 2, “Label the Turkey” worksheets.

* 20+ interesting turkey facts. Pick your favorites, share with your students, then use this background information to check their comprehension.

* A follow up “Some interesting facts I learned about turkeys” writing prompt worksheet.

* 10 photo-posters of wild and domestic turkeys.

* 2 Venn diagrams, which come in color to do as a whole group, as well as BW to be done individually or with a partner.

* 3 photo-posters of a peacock for a comparison-contrast activity.

* A “Turkeys Are Can Have” worksheet in color and BW
* A “Would you like to have a turkey as a pet?” writing prompt worksheet.
* A “Describe a Turkey” worksheet for adjective and descriptive writing practice.

* 2 life cycle of a turkey crafts. One's a slider the other a "Turn & Learn Wheel" Plus several matching worksheets & a game.

All come in BW as well as color, so that you can quickly & easily make samples to share; and finally,

* 2 “We learned about turkeys today! Ask me what I know.” color-me bookmarks. 

Renee over in Virginia, asked me if I had any Thanksgiving-themed  "Fix The Sentence" cards, as her students have enjoyed a few of my other seasonal "pocket chart punctuation" packets. 

Just finished them, so I thought I'd include them in this blog post as well.   

These 28, Thanksgiving-themed sentence cards, are a quick, easy and fun way to practice capitalization and end punctuation, while reinforcing some factual information about the first Thanksgiving.

Choose your cards, then read them together as a whole group to practice lots of Dolch sight words.

Pick a student to come up and using a dry erase marker, circle letters that should be capitalized and then add end punctuation. (period, question mark & exclamation point).

You can do this on a whiteboard, with a pocket chart, or pass a card out to each child to correct.

For more practice, as an individual activity, have students choose X number of mini cards and rewrite the sentences correctly on one of the 7 worksheet options.

Afterwards, students can swap their paper with a partner to correct.

I've included 2 sizes of mini "fix the sentence" cards for this, which makes a nice Daily 5 word work activity too.

There are 28 mini cards on one sheet of paper. Simply print, laminate and trim several copies, for a class set. 

The featured FREEBIE today is a collection of fall-themed, 2D shape matching games.  Students place the colored shape tile on to the matching shape on the leaf, spider, bat, owl, or turkey card.  

I've included a blank template for each theme, so you can program with more shapes or whatever. Hope your kiddos enjoy them as much as mine.

Well that's it for now. Thanks for stopping by. Time to hit the road and do some grocery shopping for turkey day.

Lots to do when our crowd of 20+ gathers.  Feeling very blessed.  Wishing you a warm-fuzzy kind of day.

"When I was growing up, and other people I knew were getting into trouble, I was somewhere in a deer stand or going to bed early, so I could be up before dawn to hunt turkeys. My love of the outdoors kept me solid.  - Donald Trump, Jr.

1-2-3 Come Make a Terrific Thanksgiving Turkey Craft With Me!

If you're looking for some fresh new turkey "craftivities" that your kiddo's will enjoy, you've come to the right place!  Here are some of my all-time favorites.  I hope you find a few that you'll want to make with your own little turkeys.

Turkey Art Projects + Activities is a whopping 81-pages long and features over a dozen quick and easy turkey crafts + a few worksheets, songs and a game.

It was one of the first units that I put together 3 years ago, before I had all of the fonts, and software programs that I use now for a more professional look, so all of the patterns are hand drawn in this packet. 

They are still easy to follow, with complete directions.  If you have construction paper, glue, scissors and crayons, then you're all set!  Click on the link to view/download the Turkey Craftivities packet. 

Happy Fall Y'all is a football-shaped turkey.  Under his wing is a poem I wrote so you can have a teachable moment about rhyming words:

November’s for turkeys with piping-hot stuffing
and blowing winds that are huffing and puffing.
Orange, red, and yellow, fall-colored leaves
sweatshirts with warm, snuggly-long sleeves.
Tiny-tot turkeys that go gobble-gobble
jointed and cute, that wibble and wobble.
They say: “Stay inside and watch some football.”
and oh by the way “Happy Fall Y’all!”

Hyrum is an adorable stuffed turkey.  His body is a lunch bag stuffed with scrap paper.  He's wonderful for fine motor practice, and makes an adorable centerpiece for your kiddo's to present to their mommies.

Patty is a paper chain turkey that can be used to practice pattering and counting.  For writing practice, have students write their spelling words, fall vocabulary, or things that they are thankful for on each strip.

Turk, the ribbon-legged turkey, is a sweet dangler.  To incorporate writing with this art project, give students a prompt and have them complete it, and then glue it to the back of Turk.

Trudy is the thankful turkey.  A note home is included, so parents can help children write what they are thankful for on the feathers and then glue them to the turkey.  Accordion-folded legs, are great fine motor practice too.

If you'd like to practice counting, you may want to make Clark the Count On Me turkey booklet.  There's a blank circle template if you want to work on teen or higher numbers, or even skip-counted numbers.  

Clara is made out of a TP tube and reviews counting as well as colors.  Wiggle eyes, a 3D mouth and pipe cleaner feet, all add to her goofy appearance.  My Y5's LOVED her; she makes a cute table decoration too.

All of the above turkey craftivities can be found in the Turkey Art and Activities packet along with a few more + some songs, worksheets and a game.  Click on the link to view/download it.

In another packet, is one of my personal favorites.  I named her Gabby The Crumb Gobbler.  I was inspired by my beloved grama Lydia when I designed it.  She always said: "Many hands make light work." so I made a little poem, with that thought in mind: "Many hands make light work, this I know is true, so let my little turkey, gobble up crumbs for you."

Children color and cut Gabby's head and glue her to the top half of a paper plate and then color the ridged portion of the rim to look like mini feathers. 

Her body acts like a dustpan.  The quarter section "wing" is the sweeper.  This really does work and "sweeps" crumbs off the table, onto Gabby, and then into the garbage!

Students glue the poem to the center and practice "sweeping."  I paperclip the sections together and send them home.   My Y5's always thought their "turkey broom" was especially fun.  Click on the link to view/download Gabby.

Finally, there's Thomas the twirled turkey. His body sports another poem:

"This is my turkey round and fat.  His feathers show a color pattern imagine that! Red-Orange-and Yellow make him a bright happy fellow.  I twirled strips of color around a pencil you see, then glued them as feathers, so my picture's 3D. He's a special present to you from me.  Made with lots of TLC."

Twirling strips of colored paper around a pencil, was not only great fine motor practice, but enjoyable for my Y5's too.

I've also included Sally for scissor snipping practice in this packet.  Click on the Turkey Twirling link to view/download them.

I design and try to blog daily, so I hope you can stop by tomorrow for the latest FREEBIES.

"For in every adult there dwells the child that was, and in every child there lies the adult that will be." -John Connolly