10 Fat Turkeys Book Companion November Preschool Kindergarten 1st 2nd Special Ed

About this resource

One theme, one week. Read the same turkey countdown story every day at circle time, and pull one

simple activity after the read-aloud each day — sort, count down, find the letter, play hide and

seek in order, then build a craft. Every student page has one short instruction with a picture, so

a paraprofessional can run the room from it too.

This week pairs with **10 Fat Turkeys by Tony Johnston** (or any counting-down turkey story you

already have). Not affiliated with the author or publisher. You need your own copy of the book;

nothing from it is reproduced here, and every turkey in the file is our own generic coloring-book

turkey, not the book's characters.

EVERYTHING INSIDE (57 pages)

• 1 Start Here week plan: what to do after the read-aloud each day, plus what else it practices
• 1 book-and-words page naming the read-aloud, an original circle-time chant ("Where Did the

Turkeys Go?," written for this unit — no song or story text is reprinted), and the 9 circle-time

vocabulary words

• 9 smartboard slides for whole-group circle time on a projector or interactive board: the cover

art, name the pictures, sort, count (3 slides), the letter hunt, the life skill in order, and the

core word

• 9 circle-time vocabulary cards to cut out and use at the carpet (turkey, ten, corn, pumpkin, pie,

basket, tractor, cow, duck)

• Day 1, Sort (animal or food?), at 3 levels: Level 1 errorless matching, Level 2 the standard

two-group sort, Level 3 a third group added (animal, food, or toy) — 10 cut-and-glue pieces on

every level

• Day 2, Count down the turkeys, at 3 levels: Levels 1 and 2 count 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 — one turkey is

gone on every row — with a 5-piece numeral strip to cut and glue; Level 3 counts 10 down to 6 and

writes the number, no cutting

• Day 3, Letter T, at 3 levels: Level 1 glues 5 matching T's, Level 2 finds T among 10 look-alike

letters, Level 3 says 10 pictures aloud and glues the 5 that start with the /t/ sound

• Writing, at 3 levels: Level 1 traces the big letters, Level 2 traces letters and the word,

Level 3 writes the letters and the word independently on primary lines

• Day 4, a life-skill sequencing page: 5 picture pieces (4 real steps to play hide and seek —

cover your eyes, count to ten, go and look, found the turkey — first/next/then/last, plus 1 that

does not belong)

• Day 5, a book craft: color and cut a 7-piece hiding turkey (a big friendly turkey, five tail

feathers numbered 1 to 5 to glue in order, and a haystack to glue over its feet — every cut a

straight line) and glue it into a barnyard coloring scene with a fence, a pond and pumpkins

• 2 fine motor pages: a tracing-paths page (4 dashed paths from the turkey to the tractor:

straight, wave, zigzag, loops) and a cutting-practice page (4 strips, easiest first)

• 4 core-word pages for the word of the week, "gone": a big word card for the talker or core

board, a 12-word find-and-circle grid (6 of the 12 are the target word), a barn to color, and

10 turkeys to cut out and glue hiding around it — count down as each one is glued

• 1 "Who Did What This Week" data page (one row per student, a prompt-level code for each day —

handy for IEP notes and progress reports)

• 1 family letter to send home on Day 1
• 1 credits page (art and font licenses)
• Ink-saver twins of 19 picture-based student pages (the craft and pure-coloring pages are

color-only) in outline art for a photocopier, so the color pages above are optional, not required

Three Levels On Every Academic Task

Sort, count, letters and writing each come in three levels, marked with a small shape instead of

a number so children don't compare theirs to a neighbor's: a circle for starting (errorless

matching), a square for building (the standard task), a triangle for ready for more (a real step

up — a third sort group, counting 10 down to 6 with writing, or beginning sounds).

Cutting Built For Small Hands

Every cutting page carries 5 or more pieces, lined up edge to edge so each cut is one straight

line. Pre-cut them yourself for students who are not cutting independently yet.

Color Or Ink-Saver

Print the color pages, or use the ink-saver twins at the back on a photocopier — most

picture-based student pages have both (the craft and pure-coloring pages are color-only by design).

Who This Is For

Any teacher starting a self-contained preschool or early childhood special education classroom

who wants a whole week of circle time, ready to pull and go: one theme, a different simple

activity every day.

What This Is, And What It Is Not

A print-and-go weekly theme unit built around a turkey countdown theme. It is not a claim about

any student's age or rate of progress, and it does not reproduce any book, its text, or its

artwork — no character art is drawn here, only our own generic turkey, feathers, haystack and

barnyard pieces.