What Are You Thankful For?

November is a month to reflect on what we are truly thankful for.  I center my Thanksgiving lessons around this as well as the history of the holiday.  Every year I have done a "Thinking Thankful Thoughts" lesson.  I begin the lesson with reading Thanks for Thanksgiving.

  Then, I discuss with the children what I am thankful for.  Once I have given them my list, I have each student tell me one thing that they are thankful for.  Sometimes this can be a difficult concept for the students on the spectrum, but, with the help of our para and some visual cues from the book, they can usually tell us.  After we have all taken a turn, I introduce the craft that we will make.  It begins with a piece of white paper that has been cut into a circle to fit on the inside of an orange paper plate.  This is where the students will draw what they are thankful for.  Once they have drawn their picture, they will then explain to the teacher what they are thankful for.  We write in their responses and help them to glue the paper into the middle of the paper plate.  When they are all completed, we put them out in the hallway into a pumpkin patch.  It ends up looking like this:

  So, there you have a fun and simple craft to display what the students are thankful for!