by Joan Inong

Created on: October 29, 2009

If you are a teacher, Thanksgiving is a holiday that holds virtues and concepts that can easily be part of your class's lesson plan. However, it can be a little difficult to teach these concepts in a way that is understandable and highly relatable to your students. Here are a few ideas that will help you create a lesson plan about the values of Thanksgiving.

For this first lesson plan, your class will mostly concentrate about their interpretation of the values of Thanksgiving. The night before you teach this lesson, write down 5-10 questions that ask about your students' formulation of Thanksgiving. For example,

- What does Thanksgiving mean for you and your family?

- What kind of values do you think were instilled during the first Thanksgiving? Are those values still present today?

- What kind of "universal values" are held about Thanksgiving? (Sharing, community, etc.)

Ask your students these questions, and then ask them to write a few paragraphs about what they think the first Thanksgiving was like. They should either write as an American colonist or as a Native American. Then, ask a few students from each side of the story to give their accounts. How do these accounts differ? What kind of values or concepts are similar in those accounts?

The next lesson plan should concentrate about the holiday itself. This is a holiday that is generally family-oriented, and many families will celebrate Thanksgiving in their own special ways. As such, this lesson plan will help your students focus on both the differences and similarities that exist between different families' celebrations.

In order to do so, you will ask your students what a "traditional" Thanksgiving menu looks like (in the modern-day celebrations of Thanksgiving). Then, go to this website, which will help you look at the first Thanksgiving's menu. What changes occurred? Why do your students think these changes happened?

Then, ask your students, individually or in groups, to draw their version of a Thanksgiving menu. Encourage them to explain why they have chosen to include/exclude certain food items. How do different groups' menus compare? What are the similarities and differences, and why do they think these differences/similarities occur?

These two lesson plans will encourage your students to think beyond what Thanksgiving normally means for them. They will see Thanksgiving as a deeply cultural holiday that celebrates cultures, families, and the meaning of sharing between groups who are strangers to one another.

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