Creating Thanksgiving Magic With The Turkey Hands By Susan Fairchild

In this episode of The Firstieland Podcast for Elementary Teachers, your host Molly Schwab sits down with author Susan Fairchild to chat about her playful and imaginative picture book The Turkey Hands. This fun Thanksgiving story takes a creative twist on a classic classroom activity - those adorable turkey handprint crafts we all make in November! But in Susan’s story, the turkey handprints come to life at night and cause all kinds of mischief around the classroom.

Susan shares what inspired her to write The Turkey Hands, how she created the colorful illustrations, and what teachers can do to bring this story to life with their students. You’ll get ideas for turning the book into a full Thanksgiving classroom experience — from creative Thanksgiving writing prompts and craft ideas to ways to spark students’ imaginations as they become detectives trying to solve the mystery of the turkey handprint mischief.

Whether you’re looking for a new Thanksgiving read aloud, a fun way to connect literacy and writing, or an activity that gets your students giggling, this episode will help you create some true Thanksgiving magic in your classroom!

In this episode, you’ll learn:

✔️ What inspired Susan Fairchild to write The Turkey Hands

✔️ How she created the imaginative illustrations for the story

✔️ Ideas for using The Turkey Hands in your Thanksgiving lessons

✔️ Ways to combine art, writing, and creativity for an engaging classroom experience

Mentioned In This Episode

Book – The Turkey Hands by Susan Fairchild – https://amzn.to/47rJ7XS

Turkey Detectives writing resource – https://firstieland.com/detective

Guest Connections

Connect with Susan Fairchild - @susankfairchild

Let’s Stay Connected

Visit our website: www.firstieland.com

Need resources? Visit our TPT store here: https://firstieland.com/TPT-store

Need more help or ideas? Send me a message on Instagram @firstieland

To check out all the resources mentioned in this episode, head over to the show notes – https://firstieland.com/episode20

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Have a wonderful day and remember to make learning feel like play… see you next week!

💜 Molly

Full disclosure: Amazon links in my descriptions are usually affiliate links, which means if you purchase through that link, I receive a very small percentage of the sale.

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