The poem can be short or long, depending on how many ideas you have. Older students can add adjectives before the nouns.

Help your students by asking open-ended questions: What different drinks do you enjoy in summer and autumn? What do you wear on your feet? 

Here’s a list of topics that might spur ideas for a seasonal poem: 

- outside/indoor activities

- weather

- drinks/meals

- clothes

- animals

- places to visit

Students add illustrations to their poems.

They can also create their own speaking cards. 

Remind them to talk about the people (actions, clothes, physical description…) and the place (objects, food, background…) 

Put all the cards together in a box and pass it around. 

Kids pick up a card, say the word and show it to everyone. 

They pass on the box to the next person. 

If they get the turkey card, everyone goes “gobble, gobble, gobble”. 

 

All the kids get one clothespin pinned on to the back of their shirt or coat. Then the person in charge yells “Run, Turkey, Run!”  The kids all have to run and get clothespins off the others’ shirts. After a minute or so, the in charge person yells “Stop, Turkey, Stop!”  Everyone has to freeze where they are. Then continue on like that. The person with more clothespins wins!
https://lets-get-together.com/2014/10/20/diy-turkey-tag/

 When the music stops, the “squirrels” go “home” (hula hoops). Take away one hoop each time the music stops so that the “squirrels” have to share “homes.”

Have children pretend to be squirrels gathering and hiding nuts while you sing a fun song about a little squirrel.

(Tune: "I’m a Little Teapot)

Where you’ll stop, nobody knows
Tell me what you're thankful for.

But when you do, someone must say what they are thankful for this day. The player holding the turkey when the chant ends, must say aloud, one thing for which they are thankful. This continues until everyone has had a turn.

Whoever is “it” must not only touch the heads of the other players, saying, “Leaf, leaf, leaf,” but must also drop a pinecone in the lap of the child they choose before running back around the circle without being tagged. 

Thank you, for the rain
       (Move fingers down)
Thank you, for things that grow   
       (Move hands up)
Thank you, for good food to eat
       (Make circle around tummy)
Thank you, for families that love us. (Cross arms over chest)
Happy thanksgiving!