I’m busy planning and creating a few Thanksgiving activities for us to do next week. I pinned this pin a few months ago about students imagining looking at a character in a book through a keyhole and then writing and drawing about them from that perspective. I loved that idea, and when I was thinking about Thanksgiving writing prompts for my kids that idea popped into my mind. Why not write from the perspective of peeking into the life of a pilgrim or give readers a peek into your own Thanksgiving? Here are the two Thanksgiving Writing Prompts that I came up with:
I haven’t used these yet with my own kids so I made up a sample to give you an idea of how your kids could use them. Since my kids are in kindergarten and third grade, I created two different writing papers for each prompt to meet their needs and hopefully, yours, too! I thought it be fun and easy for students to draw their picture inside the rectangle on the writing paper and then cut out and glue on the keyhole. I just printed my keyhole templates out onto brown construction paper but you could have students color it in. Also, remind students to only put a small line of glue down the left hand side if they want to be able to open and close the keyhole over their picture. You could also tape or staple it on the writing paper.
For “A Peek Inside a Pilgrim’s Life”, students could write either from the perspective of the pilgrim or as the onlooker. They could even write a personal narrative about a specific event in the day and life of a certain pilgrim.
Another option would be for students to tell readers about their own Thanksgiving traditions. “A Peek into My Thanksgiving” allows students to share about how they celebrate that day. They could also write a personal narrative as well about a specific Thanksgiving memory. Students would illustrate their writing and then place the keyhole template on top of it like the other prompt.
If you’re kids need help drawing pilgrims, here are links to easy, step-by-step drawing tutorials:
I’ve also been gathering some Thanksgiving videos and songs on YouTube for us to watch next week. You can see my playlist here.
I can’t wait for my kids to write these next week and I’ll come back after they’re done and add examples of how their pieces turned out. Until then, I’d love to share these two Thanksgiving writing prompts with you to use in your own home or classroom. Simply click on the picture below to download and print! I hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving!
