One-On-One: Thanksgiving

2010 AASL Substandards:

LESSON PLAN Ref: 1      Standards:
3.1 & 3.3     

Subject / Course: Personal Education/ Personal Interest    

Topic: Thanksgiving     

Lesson Title: Where did Thanksgiving begin, and how has it changed?     

Level: 8th Lesson Duration: 45 min     

Lesson Objectives:
- Build bonds with student(s)
- Allow students to explore the library and its resources
- Provide/Show how to use multiple strategies for students to learn how to seek, find and interpret good
information
- Answer personal questions about the history of Thanksgiving     

Summary of Tasks / Actions:

- Student has questions about Thanksgiving holiday traditions.
- The Media Specialist is prints a layout of the library and through the use of Destiny, the student is able to
locate multiple print resources from all over the library.
- The student and M.S. sit down and read through the books together.
- When all the information available is collected, the student starts to compare sources. She will use the
tablet to look up specific dates of events, specific names of the important people involved and any other
question that arises during this time.
- As the student researches, the M.S. will help in facilitating proper research questions: how to lookup
facts with keywords, phrases and how to compare data.
- At the end of the research time, the student and M.S. will sit down and discuss all that was learned,
revealed and what was easy or hard about this personal project.    

Materials / Equipment: Print & Digital Resources:

- Tablet/Laptop 1. Balloons Over Broadway. Written by:
- Library/books Melissa Sweet
- Paper/Pencils 2. Thanksgiving and Other Harvest Festivals.
- Destiny      Written by: Ann Morrill
3. The Voyage of the Mayflower. Written by:
Allison Lassieur
4. The Plymouth Colony. Written by: Andrew
Santella
5. The Mayflower Story. Written by: Nathaniel
Philbrick

- Google
- history.com

LPT_WORD_01 – Lesson Plan TemplateTemplate last amended: 29/07/2009Amended by: Chris

class-templates.com
 One-On-One: Thanksgiving

Questions Asked and Answered by the Student:
1) Why is it called Thanksgiving?
2) How has Thanksgiving evolved over the years?
3) What are some food that continuously appear
throughout history?
4) What are negative occurrences that happened
during or because of Thanksgiving?
5) What are some traditions that are associated
with Thanksgiving?
6) What is one new fact learned about
Thanksgiving?
7) What event started Thanksgiving?
8) What are important moments that stem from this
holiday?
9) What is the oldest parade in the world?
10) When did turkey come into play as the main
dish?      8) The Mayflower Compact
Answers Found in Our Research:
2) It is more “commercialized.” The holiday seems
to revolve around food, rather than gathering
together to be thankful.
3) Pumpkin, Deer, Corn
4) King Philip’s War
5) Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, which was
originally started to incorporate Macy’s immigrant
workers during this holiday. Where the workers
were used to celebrations involving music, dancing
and parades. So Mr. Macy started the parade in
order to make his workers feel like they were back
at home.
6) Seafood was a main dish and there were no
potatoes at the first meal
7) The Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock and the
Native Americans shared their time and food with
them.
9) Bristol’s Fourth of July Parade

Assessments:
- This was a fun lesson plan to complete. I was able to connect with an 8th grader who has been having
some family problems and that has been affecting her school experience.
- In the future, I would like to provide more time on these one-on-one lessons. The amount of information
we could have continued to find about Thanksgiving and its history would have been amazing.
- Due to the time restraint, not all questions were able to be researched.
- The student brought in a list of questions she was curious about, but as the research progressed she
would ask “branch-off” questions. This was a wonderful turn of events, but I was not as prepared with the
print resources so most of the research ended up being digital-based.      

LPT_WORD_01 – Lesson Plan TemplateTemplate last amended: 29/07/2009Amended by: Chris

class-templates.com