Handwritten letters are one of my favorite things in the entire world. So, teaching my students to write letters is such fun - plus, it's a quick little unit so it's perfect to do right before Thanksgiving Break.

This year, I have a precious little boy in my class who often says things that just make my day! He is so sweet, earnest, adorable, and just plain funny! Before I get to the part of the story with him in it - I want to remember the "lightbulb moment" I had and some background that led up to this epiphany. 

Now, in the past at the end of this unit I've always asked the first graders who they want to mail a letter to. At first, I would just tell them to bring a stamped & addressed letter to school later that week so we could finish our project. Of course, I noticed a lot of the letters were written by parents and such. Which is totally fine! But I wanted the students to do it and I figured if I wanted them to learn it a certain way, I should be the one to teach them. Plus, it wouldn't always come back quickly because not every has stamps or envelope anymore, yada yada. 

So then, I started e-mailing their parents for the address (since it's typically a relative or friend). Then, I print each one out for them. Of course I had to take some time for this because I had to separate the return address from the mailing address and next thing you know, prepping this activity would take me 2 hours...and that's a problem...

So as they returned these papers and the first graders finished the letters they had been writing in class, I started to pull the students in small groups to address their envelopes. 

Okay - so finally it's one of my sweet first graders turns. He's sitting down, addressing his envelope. After about each line in the envelope he proceeds to put his pencil down and shake his hand out - because "oh man, it's just such hard work." Then, he finished addressing the envelope and I tell him "Good job! Now flip the envelope over, put your letter in it, lick the envelope & you're finished!" He just looks right at me and says "Oh, I've heard about this part." Of course I'm dying laughing in my head...you've heard about this? Like what, all the kids are meeting together to talk about it at recess? So I say "You've heard about this?" and he goes "yes, it's gross." So I respond "it's not that bad, just stuff it, lick it & you're good to go." He proceeds to stuff the envelope and then he puts it face down on the table (so the licking side is facing him) and fear factor style - puts his hands on each side of the envelope on the table and gives a big sigh. I say "It's okay, lick it." And he does. Then, I say "Well, how was it?!" He sweetly and very sarcastically responds: "MMMM, delicious." 

With all the new technology and advancements, there are so many things kids don't know about anymore or get to experience - like knowing what a VCR is (literally, one of my strongest readers paused for about 5 minutes when she came to this word because she had no clue what it was, let alone said), having chalkboards in schools, licking a stamp, etc. It's so fun to be able to provide them with a little bit of "old-school" experiences. 

Aw, yeah!! It's finally THANKSGIVING BREAK! I always feel a little guilty saying this. I truly LOVE teaching and seeing my students every day! They make me laugh & just make my day.  This year has been incredibly busy as I am working on getting my National Board certification as well as holding many leadership roles at my campus & of course have a life out side of work...so I am really excited to have the TIME to get check off many things that are on my to-do list so I can remain present with my students when I get back!

When things get crazy and our emotions get the best of us it's then that we must remember what we are truly thankful for.  There are so many things to be thankful for!

Originally, I wanted to make wreaths with my students and so I made the example above and everything; but then decided that since the first graders had already done the Thankful place mats, that it was too much of the same thing.

THEN I decided that I wanted my students to think a little deeper about what they were thankful for. So, instead of making the wreaths this year (although I plan to make them next year instead of the place mats), the students made turkey bags!

Then, the students wrote about what they were thankful for and why.  They then put the thankful notes in their bags. They also had to fill out a thankful pilgrim hat for each of their table mates (they wrote their name on the backs of those hats so the recipient child would know who it was from). But instead of putting those hats in their bag, they put them in the bag of the child they wrote about!

My dream would be that the students all open the bag with their families sometime during Thanksgiving dinner and read to their families what they wrote down that they were thankful for. I just think that would be such a wonderful experience for everyone involved!

We focus a lot the last few days before the break on the different traditions that the students have when celebrating Thanksgiving.

They remind me of the turkeys that are around in the Texas Hill Country during Thanksgiving, where I often celebrated Thanksgiving growing up. 

Above is a #throwback turkey activity that I put on my classroom door my first year that I taught. The students thought about something they were thankful for and wrote it on a feather. 



My 2nd or 3rd year teaching, a sweet student of mine introduced me to Albuquerque Turkey (the book). Everyone in the classroom fell in love with the song and we've been singing it in room 111 all turkey season long! 


We also had some fun hearing and sharing our own Turkey themed jokes throughout the day. 

Here are some fun Turkey projects we did this year...

These thankful turkeys were a great google search and are super cute. 


We read some wonderful turkey themed books! 

After reading some of our favorite books, we decided to disguise the turkeys so they wouldn't be eaten! Note to self: since I can never remember where I get the templates...This year I got the template here. Last year I got the template here.


This one is one of my favorite kid writing pieces from the year! It has made me laugh all day!  

The first graders made text-to-text connections.

We did these ADORABLE turkey directed drawings! 
Side notes: I was super bummed when something fell on the artwork right in the middle of the turkey body :/

Finally, one of my favorite activities that my first graders make are these turkey place mats. They turn out so great each year. In the past, I've always used painted handprints but think these are super cute & less messy too! 

We had a couple of random times today for some short Thanksgiving themed activities.

The first graders practiced their fine motor skills by cutting out these words & gluing them in a ABC order. Then they drew illustrations that matched the words.

Then, I needed some math/Thanksgiving activities and these ones I found were perfectly thematic, quick, & super easy to prep!! 

I didn't have the students roll the dice though or use the bingo dots. They just came up with an addition fact that equals 10 & then colored in one of the numbers in the 10 frame & used the cut outs for the other number.

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Hopefully this helps you in your journey to incorporate new and exciting ways to add purpose to what your students are learning! 

Happy Teaching!

Today was Crazy Hat Day at our school. I thought it would be so fun to make our own hats for the day! I googled "newspaper hats" on youtube & found so many great tutorials. My students were so creative! I loved all the hats that they made & how they showed their individual style as they created them. The parents seemed super happy too. Many said they were glad they didn't have to have finding a crazy hat on their plate with all of the other Halloween stuff going on.

  

 Monster Pencil Toppers

        

 

Roll A Monster 

The rest of the day was filled with pumpkin fun! 

At the end of the day, it was time for me to take down my October classroom decor. I am "batty" for Octobers decor!