Grab a copy of our Thanksgiving parade bingo and connect with family, develop fine motor skills all while watching the Thanksgiving day parade! This free printable thanksgiving bingo is perfect for Thanksgiving morning while watching the parade with the family. Add this fine motor tool to your Thanksgiving occupational therapy activities!
Thanksgiving Parade Bingo Cards
One of my favorite holiday traditions I have with my kids is sitting down to watch the Thanksgiving Day Parade. Watching the parade, floats, musical acts as they kick off the holiday season is such a calming and fun time for us as a family. One way that we enjoy the time together as a family is by playing Parade BINGO.
Many moons ago, I came up with this game and made a quick little BINGO board. My kids would fill in the squares with things they thought they would see in the parade, and we would mark the spaces with candy corn as we saw items on our BINGO cards.
This has been such a fun tradition for us that I’ve shared out makeshift BINGO cards on Instagram each year. This year, I decided to make a quick printout so you can play along too, with literally no-prep.
Thanksgiving Parade BINGO Game
You know how to play BINGO, but did you know that by playing the simple game, kids are working on a variety of skill areas? Things like visual perception, discrimination, form constancy, visual memory, visual scanning, figure-ground are just some of the visual processing skills that are addressed with a game of BINGO.
Then there’s the auditory processing skills, executive functioning skills, fine motor skills, and even handwriting. Problem solving, self-awareness, and so many more skills are impacted with this simple game.
Thanksgiving Parade Bingo and Handwriting
The Thanksgiving parade BINGO game works the same way you would play any other BINGO game. Fill in the spaces, watch the parade, and when you see an item on your card, place a small marker on that space.
You could also have kids color in the space to work on hand strength and line awareness, or you could mark an “X” on the spaces. The options are limitless.
Ask kids to write out the names of items they may see in the parade:
- Marching bands
- Singers
- Dancers
- Turkeys
- Floats
- Parade balloons (Check out the full list of floats and balloons on the parade website.)
- Frosty the snowman
- Santa Claus
You can play this game too. Print out the BINGO game card below and make a handful of copies. Play as a family, or let each family member have their own card.
Send the handouts home with clients or students as “homework”. Families will get the chance to connect and build memories all while working on the skills kids need.
UPDATED! This parade bingo game has been updated with candy corn bingo markers. Use the bingo markers to up the fine motor skill development level:
- Color the candy corn markers
- Cut out the bingo markers on the lines or around the curves of the candy corns.
- Place the bingo markers on the bingo board
- Or, use real candy corn (or crumbled paper, play dough, beads, or other markers) for fine motor precision skills.
Have fun with your game of Thanksgiving Parade BINGO. Enjoy!
Pair the Thanksgiving Parade BINGO game with more tools to support development with our Thanksgiving Fine Motor Kit!
Colleen Beck, OTR/L has been an occupational therapist since 2000, working in school-based, hand therapy, outpatient peds, EI, and SNF. Colleen created The OT Toolbox to inspire therapists, teachers, and parents with easy and fun tools to help children thrive. Read her story about going from an OT making $3/hour (after paying for kids’ childcare) to a full-time OT resource creator for millions of readers. Want to collaborate? Send an email to contact@theottoolbox.com.
