Free Lesson Plan for Thanksgiving – Day 4
This year as we go through the Thanksgiving holidays without my husband here, our boys needed more to occupy themselves. This Free Lesson Plan For Thanksgiving has become a 5 day unit study we knew you would enjoy implementing in your homeschool classroom as well. We are focusing these lessons around the book The Very First Thanksgiving, but you can easily adapt to your preferred version of the story behind this holiday. As you go through each days activities, work with your kids to remind them thankfulness should be found every day, not just in this season.
Math Lesson Plan
Use today as a day to review by going back over the Measurements and Addition & Subtraction Worksheets. You can do do this lesson alongside your sensory bin to give your kids a bit more variety of items to both measure, as well as pull from he bin to add or subtract. Count how many items are in the sensory bin. Divide by type of item and count those individually. Create addition or subtraction items around the different types of items. “How many animals are left after you subtract all of the pigs?” or similar are great word problems for older students.
Language Arts Lesson Plan
Read one or all of the recommended Thanksgiving stories. Add to the “I Am Thankful For” prompt again. Make sure to encourage your child to come up with new things every day.
Print this Thanksgiving Language Arts Worksheet, have your child draw a picture from the story. Then write a sentence about it on the lines below. If your child is younger, and not yet writing have them dictate a sentence to you and watch you write it.
Art Lesson Plan
Create your own Mayflower. Provide your child with blue construction paper, and a paint brush with blue paint-instruct them to paint waves near the bottom. Paint your child's hand with brown paint, press hand on top of the waves for the main part of the boat. Allow paint to dry. Cut 3 sails from white construction paper, and glue to “fingers”. Add a sun, clouds, or even birds to the sky in your masterpiece. Turn your artwork into a reusable place mat by laminating it with clear contact paper. Don't forget to date the back before covering it. If you have older children who want to participate but feel the hand print is too childish, have them free paint a ship.
History/Geography Lesson Plan
Discuss with your child WHY we celebrate Thanksgiving. In 1621 the colonists and Wampanoag Indians shared what we know as the first Thanksgiving- called autumn harvest feast. It was not actually declared a national holiday until 1863, by President Abraham Lincoln, during the civil war.
Sensory Bin Ideas
Create a sensory experience with the paint you use for the Mayflower art project. Stir cloves, pumpkin pie spice, apple cider mix, hot cocoa, and other seasonings into your child's paint. Let them finger paint with these paints to really amp up the sensory fun. Not only will it be great for feeling the different textures, this will also be a great sensory activity for sights and smells.
Additional Resources
