Get ready for Turkey Day with these ‘Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving activities! We’ve cooked up a smorgasbord of Thanksgiving activities that pair perfectly with the beloved book. Bring a fiesta of fun to your ‘Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving read-aloud!

‘Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving activities are a feast for the imagination and foundational literacy skills. Dive into delicious early literacy activities like word searches, alphabetizing, matching rhyme pairs, and sorting synonyms and parts of speech. For more advanced literacy, students will sequence the story, make connections to the text, and discuss the story through prompts and activities. These activities are a heaping helping of critical thinking and social skills.

As a result of the included activities, students will be able to:

• solve thanksgiving themed word searches.
• alphabetize names from the story.
• illustrate and write about a Thanksgiving meal.
• match rhyming pairs.
• match synonyms. 
• sort nouns, verbs, adjectives, pronouns, and prepositions.
• sequence the story.
• sort story elements.
• make text to self, text to text, and text to world connections.
• apply writing skills with included writing templates and prompts.
• practice reading comprehension with included discussion questions for beginning, middle, and end of the book.
• engage in social skills with included whole group prompts and activities.
• develop fine motor skills with included coloring, tracing, cutting, and gluing activities.
• create a gratitude chain. 
• use digital tools to play turkey-themed math games. 

These activities can be used by the whole group, at stations or centers, or provide student choice. They’re perfect for differentiation and focusing on specific learning goals and skills. Now that’s a cornucopia of learning we can all be thankful for!

💙 Hungry for more page-turning engagement? Stuff your lesson plans with these novel ideas!

💙After gobbling up your download of ‘Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving activities, make your read-aloud a feast for the ears with the soundscape in your Novel Effect app!

About the Book

The day before Thanksgiving, a group of children visit a turkey farm. They meet Farmer Mack Nuggett and his coop of cockerels. The children and turkeys giggle and gobble, and everything is gravy. As the trip ends, the children leave the farm with full hearts—and bulging bellies—reminding people and poultry alike that there is much to be thankful for. 

Don’t have the book yet? You can buy the book here!