Large Group Literacy: Thanksgiving

There Was An Old Lady Who Swallowed a Pie retelling
Our favorite old lady!  Now we can add some predictions in as well.  We've seen the old lady and the books make a book bag, the old lady and the fly died, what will happen to this old lady?
Again, make your props from whatever works for you.

Writing Up a Thanksgiving Feast
This is one of my FAVORITE class lists and each year I always forget to take a picture of it.
On chart paper, I make a giant plate, cup, fork, spoon, knife, and napkin.  All of these objects are labeled.  Then, the students suggest what they would like to eat (or drink) for Thanksgiving.  I try to match the color of the food to the words they offer and organize them on the plate and in the glass where they fit.  Rolls are brown, salad is green, tomatoes and cucumbers and other salad fixing get written on top of the salad in their color.  Mashed potatoes are gray, gravy is brown and written on top of the mashed potatoes word.  The students have fun filling up the plate and cup with words and colors.

Thankful Tree
Students draw or write on a leaf what they are thankful for and we post them to a tree cutout placed outside of our classroom.

Emotional Journaling: The Base Emotions

Some people have emotional intelligence.  They understand how they feel, how they react when they feel certain ways, and have the words to tell others how to best comfort them in those situations.  They understand how emotions can stir reactions in other and better support others in those moments.
Most children are building their emotional knowledge.  Some only get an understanding of the base emotions: happy, sad, angry, etc.  What are we doing to help children become successful in their understanding of emotions?  To learn more than just being happy or sad?  To help them understand how to calm down and channel their anger in a constructive way?

I have begun working on Guided Journals with the children of my home.  You can follow along by writing your own journal or making your own blog post discussing these points.

Page 1:

I printed copies of Plutchik's Wheel of Emotions for each of the kids to put on their first page.  We took color pencils and colored each emotion of the innermost wheel with colors that we connected to those emotions.  ONLY COLOR THOSE INNER EMOTIONS.  Save the rest for later.

My daughter shared that she selected the colors for each piece based on characters in Inside Out.  

On the back of the page, we listed down the side those emotions in any order of our choosing.  Then we wrote what makes us feel that way next to each emotions.
Beneath that section, we wrote a way that others could help us to feel happy again or things that we could do for ourselves to feel happy.

As you can see, there is no focus on accurate spelling.  The idea is to be comfortable with identifying your feelings, connecting experiences to those feelings, and demonstrating an understanding of those feelings.  The more we write, the more improvement in spelling and grammar will naturally occur. 

Feel free to link up in the comments.  How are you feeling?