True spirit of celebration

TOMORROW marks Thanksgiving in America, but, of course, it will be celebrated by Americans (and everyone who enjoys a party / feast) around the world, but what actually is this event and how can we use its messages in the classroom?

Traditionally, Thanksgiving falls on the fourth Thursday in November and is basically a harvest festival.  In 1621, the Plymouth colonists and Wampanoag Native Americans shared an autumn harvest widely believed to be one of the first celebrations of the holiday.

It marked a successful growing season, as the harvests in the previous year had failed and many of the pilgrims and local population had starved to death. The most popular Thanksgiving food is turkey, which is often the centrepiece of a Thanksgiving meal.

Other staple Thanksgiving foods are mashed potatoes, stuffing, gravy and cornbread.  After the enormous Thanksgiving meal, Americans often play American football in the backyard with the family or settle down to watch football games on TV. Thanksgiving is a national holiday in America and is, of course, the start of the countdown to Christmas.

The spirit of Thanksgiving is being grateful and thankful for the important things in our lives.  It is always a good idea to encourage students to think about what they have got in comparison to what they haven’t and equally to compare their lives with other children around the world. 

There are plenty of ways to do this and they can form part of ther Social Studies Curriculum at this time of year.

Here are some examples:

• Gratitude Game Children sit in a circle on the floor, (older children can make their chairs into a circle).  After highlighting some of the things that you are grateful for, go around the circle and encourage the students to highlight what they are grateful for, and why. This is a wonderful activity to do at this or any time of
  year because it encourages reflection which is a very important skill for students to develop as they grow from children into young adults.
• Charity Of course being thankful for what you have is a powerful means of highlighting the fact that other people in the world aren’t as fortunate. 
  A Thanksgiving charity could be chosen by the class or the school and donations could be requested or a harvest fair embarked upon to raise money for the worthy cause. Many schools in America make this an annual event using Thanksgiving as the time to announce the charity they will be supporting in the year ahead.
  
• World Harvest Harvest festivals are celebrated in wonderful ways around the world. A study of this can produce a wonderful assembly or termly learning plan for students linking in English, Geography, History, Art and even Science.   For example, did you know that in Barbados, Harvest Festival is called Crop Over
  and is celebrated in June and July. In Malaysia, harvest is celebrated in May and the festival includes buffalo racing, but in Sri Lanka, many harvest festivals take place in December and are combined with Christmas celebrations. A good homework question to ask children is why they think harvest festivals take place at different times of year.