I am Thankful Turkey -

Turkeys are cute and fascinating. Students love everything about these gobbling waddling creatures, including this I am Thankful Turkey!

A paper turkey being colored in by a child with feathers that have what the child is thankful for written on them.

We can’t help but be completely enthralled when we get into our Turkey facts and research project.

Diving into our stacks of Turkey Books is a fun way to incorporate this fall favorite into our literacy centers.

Students show off their emerging reading skills with Turkey Initial Sounds and Turkey Editable Sight Word Craftivity.

Because providing our little learners with crafts and curriculum activities helps them to learn new things without realizing they are learning.

So we find various things students enjoy to create right in our classroom. There are so many different crafts that make learning exciting.

This I am Thankful Turkey is a great way to bring crafts and literacy together in a hands-on way.

Want even more ways to integrate crafts into your curriculum? Be sure to take a look at our Endless Paper Craft Activity Mega Bundle.

Supply list for the I am Thankful Turkey:

I am Thankful Turkey Template (download below!)
Colored paper
Scissors
Paper glue
Glitter (optional)
Crayons

Getting the I am Thankful Turkey Ready:

To get this Thanksgiving craft ready, you’ll need to print the template. You can either print on white paper and have students color the entire thing or print the “parts” on colored paper for a little bit of variety. Next, you’ll cut out the turkey pieces from the template.

This I am Thankful Turkey is a great way to bring crafts and literacy together in a hands-on way.

Making the I am Thankful Turkey Craft:

Students will cut out each piece for different parts of the turkey craft. You may want to have brown bodies and different colored feathers or let the students color the entire turkey any way that they choose.

Cutting and gluing is a great way to work on fine motor skills.

For our younger learners or students that may struggle to cut out all their turkey pieces, you may want to cut them out ahead of time.

To get this freebie, use the ‘click here to download’ button at the bottom of this page.

Students will then write what they are thankful for on each feather.

You can have them dictate their answers to an adult, copy words off a word bank, or sound out their words and kid-code or kid-spell each word.

After that, the feathers are glued on the turkey. I find it best to have a completed turkey so they can look at the example while putting theirs together.

Once the turkeys are assembled, they can be embellished with glitter or sequins or another material, or simply left as they are.

Students will be so proud showing off their thankful turkeys. This would also make a wonderful bulletin board craft! Just think of all the different ways you can personalize them!

Looking for more ways to bring crafts and literacy together?

Make learning the alphabet fun while creating adorable alphabet crafts with our Animal Alphabet Letter Crafts. These are great for your letter of the week units.