Thanksgiving with Kaplan's Depth and Complexity

I LOVE using Kaplan's concepts of Depth and Complexity to challenge my young learners. Here is how we can incorporate it into our Thanksgiving themes:

I love the book:

It details the way making whipped cream has changed over the years. Not only the technology of electric beaters but also how refrigerated things were stored and how shopping at Wal-mart to buy the ingredients was not how it has always been. I like to have the students actually try to make whipped cream the old-fashioned way while I read the story-we pass around a big bowl and they whip it with a whisk.

We make placemats to deliver with Meals on Wheels. I just cut out different colored squares and they are expected to create a pattern around the outside.

You could also examine the different patterns in Native American art, pottery and beading projects.

Think like a Historian. Talk about what artifacts they have found from the past including the drawings on cave walls. Have students make mud paintings of things historians of the future would discover about Americans.

Change the title of the Plump and Perky Turkey-add different adjectives. What other details of the story would change.