Thanksgiving is the day we all cherish and look forward to in November. With all those happy thoughts and warm feelings it brought, who doesn’t get pretty much excited to celebrate?
As we approach this most anticipated holiday, we get a bit happier and busier, too! Everything becomes more about yummy pies, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, stuffing, gravy, and terrific turkeys! So at last, this is the time when we get reunited with the whole family and friends. We help prepare delicious foods and then enjoy the dinner together. Suddenly, we get cozy sharing what we are thankful for and get to enjoy some board games or activities with them. Or we just enjoy being couch potatoes watching Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and football. Thanksgiving may be all about food and family. But this is also the time when we give the most expensive gift to our families and friends – our time.
Thanksgiving has taken over the school, too. So if you’re looking for Thanksgiving inspired activities, here is a list we compiled that you may use during your therapy sessions. Thanks to these wonderful bloggers who shared these exciting activities. We are not affiliated to any of them, but we thought that these are very timely, appropriate, and helpful for you.
Darla Hutson of thepreschooltoolbox objectives here is to “encourage the foundation of fine motor skills, directionality, transferring, spatial relationships, and to raise awareness of the differences between writing and drawing through the use of line paths.”
“Here’s a fun turkey craft that also allows for lots of fine motor practice– a golf tee turkey! This fine motor activity is perfect for preschoolers and makes a cute centerpiece for the Thanksgiving table,” said Chelsea of buggy and buddy.
Becky of thisreadingmama believes that “practicing scissor skills is a great way to strengthen those fine motor muscles used for writing. She created a Thanksgiving-themed cutting practice pack she’s calling Cut it Out! The pack has four different levels: Level 1- Straight Lines, Level 2- Curved Lines, Level 3- Zig-Zag Lines, and Level 4-Shapes.”
“I made this super easy turkey activity to work on color recognition and fine motor skills with my little guy this week. This was also great to practice the pincer grip and to identify patterns. It’s important to practice fine motor skills at this age because without well-developed fine motor skills they may have difficulty learning to write when they start preschool and kindergarten. It also helps build muscle control to tackle tasks such as cutting, zipping, and tying shoelaces.” This is from Jackie of iheartartsncrafts.
Here is Christie of mamaot’s take on all Thanksgiving activities:
- Feed the turkey
- Fine motor/visual motor skills addressed: Pincer grasp, bilateral coordination, hand-eye coordination, in-hand manipulation
- Play-dough toothpick turkey
- Fine motor/visual motor skills addressed: Pincer grasp, tripod grasp, strengthening fingers and web space, separation of the two sides of the hand, bilateral coordination, hand-eye coordination
- Clothespin toilet paper roll turkey
- Fine motor/visual motor skills addressed: Pincer grasp, strengthening fingers/hands/web space, bilateral coordination, hand-eye coordination, grading (adjusting) force used when holding TP tube and squeezing clothespins
- Button the feathers on the turkey
- Fine motor/visual motor skills addressed: Pincer grasp, bilateral coordination, hand-eye coordination, buttoning/self-help skills
Michelle of craftymorning said “here’s a cute idea to make for Thanksgiving ~ a paper bag turkey puppet! It is also a writing activity where either an adult or the kids write what they are thankful for.”
I am so excited to share our Thanksgiving printable pack that is full of turkey and fall-themed activities for kids. It has over 30 pages so there is plenty to choose from–your kids can color, dot, trace, write, cut, count, and a whole bunch more all through the month of November – Katie of alittlepinchofperfect
“Today I am excited to share our latest busy bag activity with you; it is a great activity to also work on your little one’s fine motor skills. Keep reading to learn more about our Beaded Turkey Patterns Busy Bag.
I’ve included some printable task cards to make this activity re-useable, so check those out, too!” An excerpt from Kristina of schooltimesnippets
For more of fun activities for your therapy session, you can find them here.
