Thanksgiving

 Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving Plate

Final Project     ⇌     Kristina Johnson

Image Source: Kristina Johnson

OVERVIEW

Lesson Plan: Thanksgiving

Level: 5º

Subject: English and culture

Materials Needed: One Thanksgiving dish posterboard per assigned student small group, writing/art utensils, small group workspace, and pencil sharpener(s), and one printout of slide 42 from the Thanksgiving Slideshow per student 

Digital Tools and Sources: Thanksgiving Slideshow and SMART Board

Time: 45 minutes (one class session)

FINAL PROJECT

The topic I chose for my final project was Thanksgiving. I chose this topic because students celebrated Thanksgiving the year before and enjoyed the holiday meal. The other language assistants and I wanted to discuss the major family holiday and the traditional and typical dishes. Thanksgiving is a major and important holiday in the United States (U.S.). We decided to incorporate the students' background knowledge of what a Thanksgiving meal is with our small group activity. 

WHY THIS ACTIVITY?

This was our first experience working together as the school's three language assistants. Thanksgiving was important to all of us, so we discussed what were the most important elements to include of it. We discussed Black Friday and the Macy's Day Parade as well and made sure to include them. I was surprised to discover that Black Friday sales occur here in Spain as well, as Thanksgiving is not a national holiday here. 

By discussing one of our biggest holidays with our students and colleagues, we were able to create a strong foundation for what would soon become great working relationships. Students enjoyed seeing photos of our families and lives back where we lived. They loved seeing our friends and families. Social connections are important to adolescents, which is why we chose to work with the colleague who had the most family photos from Thanksgiving to share with the students.

RATIONALE

This presentation served as a diagnostic piece, as I had never worked with any of these students at that time and was not familiar with any of the previous evaluations or assessments administered to them or any of the English curriculum the students were taught. 

OBJECTIVES

Students can identify different traditional Thanksgiving dishes, illustrate the traditional dishes onto a poster, follow English directions, speak English in small groups, label traditional dishes, and verbally present Thanksgiving plates to their peers.

MATERIALS NEEDED

• One Thanksgiving dish posterboard per assigned student small group
• Writing/art utensils 
• Small group workspace
• Pencil sharpener(s)
• One printout of slide 42 from the Thanksgiving Slideshow per student 
• Thanksgiving Slideshow 
• SMART Board

ACTIVITY

Students are instructed by the main teacher (native Spanish speaking teacher) to be seated and that they will listen to a Thanksgiving presentation. The three other language assistants take turns presenting assigned sections of the slides to the class (these are decided before the presentation based on strengths and weaknesses). Students review the vocabulary from slide 42 and repeat each word after the language assistant says them. Students then view the instructions and are told that they will create their own Thanksgiving plate in their already assigned small groups. They will each draw a dish and write the name of the dish on the plate. They are allowed to color it once they completed it. After 15 minutes, the small groups were to present their plates to the class. One printout of slide 42 from the Thanksgiving Slideshow was administered to each student before allowing them begin working in small groups.

The main teacher and language assistants assisted students in following the directions and remaining on task while completing the activity. After fifteen minutes students presented their Thanksgiving plates to their classmates. This activity served to be a positive language experience, which is absolutely crucial in school success with adolescents. Teachers must create lessons that connect with the students, as the adolescent's mind is still malleable with its opinion formation (“Social Influence on Positive Youth Development: A Developmental Neuroscience Perspective - PMC”). This project was successful because we had an appropriate number of main teachers and language assistants to meet all language needs. Support was provided to students who needed better visual cues for the names of their dishes by having teachers display the dish's photo on the SMART Board. After presentations were completed, teachers gathered the posters to create a Thanksgiving display in a hallway.

SOURCES

"Social Influence on Positive Youth Development: A Developmental Neuroscience Perspective- PMC." PubMed Central (PMC). https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6345387/. Accessed 12 Jan. 2024. 

Thanksgiving © 2023 by Kristina Johnson is licensed under CC BY 4.0