Thanksgiving FUN!

I can't believe the holiday season is upon us! November is a time to give thanks, and I am definitely thankful this November!  Thankful for two healthy and happy children, thankful for a husband who is willing to stay home with them each day, thankful for 25 smiling faces each morning!  I could really go on and on!  

I love everything about the holiday season in my classroom!  With November comes chilly air, hot coffee, warm sweaters.  It also brings some days of inside recess (blahhh)! It brings thankfulness!  And... it brings Native Americans, pilgrims, turkeys, and a lot of FUN! I am amazed with what my students have learned so far this year!  I love their desire and eagerness to learn! 

So... November it is!  And, this is a little sneak peak of what we will be up to!!!

My classroom is ready to go.... I love these cute thanksgiving table headers! I really enjoy the month of October with its spiders and bats.  But... I was so glad to hang up some turkeys!

I'm going to begin the month learning about the Sioux Indians.  The Sioux Indians are just FUN!  We are going to learn all about their culture, their respect for their land, how they depended on their natural resources, why they lived in tepees, and we are even going to make our own classroom tepee! We will also be learning some map skills as we join the Sioux on a great hunt for buffalo!  Can you tell I'm just a little excited about the week ahead?!?! 

We will write paragraphs about the Sioux on these cute little tepees...

Our buffalo hunt....

We will be using this informational book/PowerPoint to help us learn all about the Sioux! I will also be reading parts of If You Lived With The Sioux by Ellen Levine.  I just love all of the "If you lived with..." books!!!

 I will have a guided reading group in Buffalo Before Breakfast. Actually, they already started it on Tuesday! My kiddos just love Magic Tree House this year!!!

After learning about the Sioux, we will explore the Wampanoag!  You can't celebrate Thanksgiving without the Wampanoag, right?!?

If You Lived at the Time of Squanto is a great book for introducing those special Native Americans who helped the pilgrims! My kiddos will be making these informative lap books!! And...I'm in the process of making a Wampanoag & Pilgrim PowerPoint to add to the unit.  I'm hoping to have it finished by the end of the day! 

As we move on to learn about the pilgrims, my students will be pretending that they are pilgrim children and completing these cute books.  They will write about their homes, chores, games, and food. 

Of course, we have to have a little turkey FUN!!! 

We are going to paint these cute turkeys and write cinquain poems.

We are also going to make these cute turkey hats!! You can grab it for FREE HERE.

This unit includes a few literacy and math stations...

-ed endings {My kiddos always have the hardest time with those tricky endings!  I don't know how many students spell stopped - stopt} So... this station comes at a perfect time!!!!

Contraction Match Up

Irregular Plural Nouns Memory or Match Up

This unit has a TON of other activities as well...  Informational and opinion writing, interactive notebook pages to go with our Thanksgiving books, Thanksgiving on Thursday comprehension guide {I'm using this when my kiddos finish Buffalo Before Breakfast}, and SO MUCH MORE!

AND... I'm am so excited that I just finished up some reading passages and comprehension questions to go along with my Thanksgiving unit!!!! 

I'm constantly asking my students to PROVE their answers and show me the evidence!!! These passages and questions were designed to help move my students beyond a literal understanding and to a deeper and more critical evaluation of the text. I will be using these printables with my guided reading groups.  

And there you have it.... November in a Nutshell...

You can find my Thanksgiving Extravganza HERE.

My November Reading Passages can be found HERE.

So... I'm off to love on my little cuties while I still can!!

Until next time...

Hollie