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Turkey Theme Therapy Slide Deck

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Turkey theme slide deck for occupational therapy

Whether you are looking for turkey activities for teletherapy, or some added ways to make occupational therapy sessions fun this time of year, our latest free therapy slide deck is for you. Below, you can access a free turkey theme therapy slide deck to use as an outline for occupational therapy interventions or to add motor skills to help kids thrive.

Turkey theme slide deck for occupational therapy

Turkey Theme Therapy Slide Deck

Today’s turkey theme slide deck is just one more in the series of free interactive slide decks for occupational therapy. You can access all of the free slides at the bottom of this blog post.

For more occupational therapy teletherapy activities, check out this blog post.

This turkey theme therapy slide deck covers a variety of areas:

  • Gross motor warm up
  • Fine motor skills
  • Handwriting
  • Visual perceptual skills and visual motor skills
  • Self-regulation
Turkey theme gross motor slide deck for occupational therapy interventions

Turkey theme gross motor activity

Use the gross motor warm up to challenge motor planning, core strength, and bilateral coordination. Use this warm up activity for whole-body movement to get ready for working on other areas in therapy.

Turkey theme fine motor slide deck for occupational therapy interventions

Turkey theme Fine Motor Activities

The fine motor portion of this free slide deck uses sign language as a way to get fingers and hands moving. Kids can follow along with the slide deck to spell out “TURKEY” while copying images and practicing the American Sign Language.

These activities help kids with visual motor skills, separation of the sides of the hand, finger isolation, arch development, and more.

Turkey theme handwriting slide deck for occupational therapy interventions

Turkey theme Handwriting Activity

This slide is open-ended and designed to meet the needs of a variety of ages and levels of children. Kids can write a list of the clothing words to dress the turkey. Other kids might write a sentence using certain clothing names as they disguise a turkey. Still other children might write a paragraph.

The slide can also be used as a visual discrimination or visual memory activity. Ask students to look at the slide and then switch it out. Can they remember all of the clothing items on the disguise the turkey activity?

turkey theme visual perception slide deck for occupational therapy interventions

Turkey theme Visual Perception Activity

Next, ask students to move the interactive turkey through the maze as they work on a variety of visual perceptual skills and eye-hand coordination.

turkey theme self regulation slide deck for occupational therapy interventions

Turkey theme Self Regulation Activity

Finally, students can fill in the self-regulation checklist as they take a self assessment of their feelings, emotions, and behaviors. This is a good time to end the therapy session and come up with some strategies or coping tools to address any self-regulation needs.

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Enjoy and have fun!

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    More interactive therapy slide decks you will enjoy:

    Here is a slide deck for a Social Story for Wearing a Mask.

    Here is a Space Theme Therapy Slide Deck.

    Here is a Therapy Planning Interactive Slide Deck.

    Here is a Back to School Writing Activity Slide Deck.

    Here is an Alphabet Exercises Slide Deck.

    Here is a Self-Awareness Activities Slide Deck.

    Here is a Strait Line Letters Slide Deck.

    Here is a “Scribble theme” Handwriting Slide Deck.

    Teach Letters with an interactive Letter Formation Slide Deck.

    Thanksgiving Fine Motor Kit
    Thanksgiving Fine Motor Kit special deal

    Thanksgiving Fine Motor Kit…on sale now!

    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.

    Turkey Crafts for Kids

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    turkey craft for kids that are great crafts for teletherapy

    Looking for easy turkey crafts for therapy, the classroom, or at home? These turkey crafts for kids are ones that are not only fun ways to celebrate Thanksgiving with kids, they are also super simple Thanksgiving ideas for virtual therapy or hybrid lessons. This time of year, turkey crafts are the way to go when it comes to facilitating fine motor skills, executive functioning, motor planning, and direction following in occupational therapy interventions. The teachers who follow this site for developmental crafts and activities, love to find crafts that build skills. Parents might look a fun art project to create and want easy crafts that kids can make on their own. These easy turkey crafts are great crafts for teletherapy, too. Start with our thankful turkey templates and go from there.

    turkey craft for kids that are great crafts for teletherapy

    These turkey crafts are quick and easy and perfect for busy mamas and papas.  

    Here are more Thanksgiving activities for kids to add to your therapy toolbox.

    Turkey Crafts for Kids

    I wanted to share super simple turkey crafts for kids that can be used in occupational therapy teletherapy sessions for the weeks leading up to Thanksgiving. Many of these turkey crafts use just a few materials, making them easy turkey crafts!

    This turkey craft uses colored construction paper to make a turkey wreath. Children can cut the feathers and practice scissor accuracy.

    Use a paper cup and construction paper to make a paper cup turkey. It’s perfect for working on fine motor skills with children.

    Use a straw and cup to encourage oral motor skills or for proprioceptive input through the mouth. Better yet, add this turkey craft to the cup for a Thanksgiving craft idea!

    To continue with the calming proprioceptive input using a straw, make a turkey craft juice box cover using a recycled paper towel tube. It’s a turkey craft that kids will get a kick out of, while working on fine motor skills.

    Make a clothes pin turkey with the turkey cut-outs in this Thanksgiving Fine Motor Kit. You’ll love how easy it is to work on fine motor skills using the 12 number cards.

    Using a recycled paper towel tube, kids can work on fine motor skills to make this fun cardboard tube turkey craft.

    Still another cardboard tube craft is this turkey stamp craft idea.

    turkey crafts for kids

    SUPER easy Turkey Crafts

    For those of us looking for super easy turkey crafts to use in teletherapy or when a quick craft is needed, these easy craft ideas are perfect:

    Turkey Coloring Page- Print off these Thanksgiving mindfulness exercises and use the turkey coloring page as a craft that supports self-regulation.

    Paper Towel Feather Turkey- This easy turkey feathers craft uses only paper towels, markers, and water to make watercolor turkey craft. This would be a great turkey craft for therapy, working on pre-writing lines, and cutting a simple shape.

    Handprint Turkey- Sometimes the classic craft is best! Work on bilateral coordination, eye-hand coordination, motor skills, and more by tracing the hand and then decorating. Take the fine motor skills up a notch and ask children to color in the turkey and then cut it out.

    Paper Plate Turkey Craft- Use a regular paper plate and cut along the edges to make feathers. Children can then draw a turkey right on the plate. try this paper plate turkey craft to work on scissor skills by cutting along the curved edge of the paper plate.

    Coffee Filter Turkey- Cut along the edge of the coffee filter, add color with a marker, and draw a turkey face on the front. Try this coffee filter turkey to work on scissor skills and fine motor skills.

    Paper Bag Turkey- Use a paper bag to make a turkey puppet craft. Use the materials you have on hand and really work on fine motor skills.

    Leaf Turkey- Grab some leaves from outside and make a leaf turkey craft. This is another fantastic fine motor craft for kids.

    Draw a Turkey- Using a guided tutorial is a nice way to work on visual motor skills and only requires a pencil, paper, and crayons. This turkey drawing guided tutorial is easy and fun.

    Shape Turkeys- Work on scissor skills and cutting easy shapes by making these shape turkeys. Such a great turkey craft for preschoolers!

    Need More Turkey Crafts?

    The Thanksgiving Fine Motor Kit is ON SALE now! This 40 page printable kit has everything you need to work on all aspects of fine motor skills. The kit includes handwriting pages, pencil control exercises, scissor skill exercises, lacing cards, clothes pin/paper clip counting cards, coloring exercises, visual motor activities, and so much more.

    Thanksgiving Fine Motor Kit

    Grab your copy of the Thanksgiving Fine Motor Kit now and start working on these areas:

    • Pencil control
    • Scissor skills
    • Hand strength
    • Pinch strength
    • Bilateral coordination
    • Eye-hand coordination
    • Visual motor skills
    • Handwriting and letter formation
    • Precision and dexterity
    • Separation of the sides of the hand
    • Coloring accuracy and endurance
    • Pre-writing line accuracy
    • Precision and dexterity
    • Pincer grasp

    Get your copy of the Thanksgiving Fine Motor Kit here.

    Thanksgiving fine motor worksheets
    Thanksgiving pencil control exercises
    Thanksgiving scissor skills activities


    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.

    Thanksgiving Sensory Bin

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    Thanksgiving sensory bin

    This Thanksgiving Sensory Bin was a fun way to foster imaginative play and develop motor skills through a sensory, textural experience. The sensory bin is a Thanksgiving activity that we enjoyed, but it would make a fun Fall sensory bin too, as it used many colors and textures of Fall. Adding in field corn, dry leaves, feathers, textured materials adds opportunities for scooping, pouring, and exploring with a Thanksgiving theme!

    Thanksgiving sensory bin for kids to play and explore textures while building fine motor skills.

    Thanksgiving Sensory Bin

    Sensory Bins are so great for exploring textures and fostering imaginative play.  They are so easy and inexpensive to make up  and can go in any theme…If your son loves superheroes, throw Spiderman figures into a bin of rice with a couple of Halloween spider rings, and you have an instant play area that can last all day long!  Use items and toys that interest your child’s passions for a sensory play experience that can also build skills.

    While the kids are exploring, imagining, fostering creativity, they are learning so much…building their confidence,  language skills, fine motor dexterity…and SO much more!    

    This holiday sensory bin offers a chance for kids to talk about Thanksgiving and discover items that foster thought, creative thinking, or family-centered materials. Items in the Thanksgiving Sensory bin can inspire gratitude and can be centered on what’s important to your family.

    Thanksgiving sensory ideas for sensory play and exploration, using many Fall materials.

    Thanksgiving Sensory Bin Base Materials

    Sensory bins can be made from any dry or wet material, water, shredded paper, packing peanuts…The possibilities are endless. Here are sensory base ideas to start with.

    To make this Thanksgiving sensory bin, you can use materials that you find around your home or outdoors. Other items can be found at the dollar store.

    Start with your Thanksgiving sensory play base material. Some ideas include dry field corn or regular popcorn, rice, dry beans, split peas. Non-food sensory bin materials can include shredded paper, feathers, or Fall leaves from outside. Dump the sensory bin base material into an under-the-bed-storage bin or other large, low bin or tray.  

    NOTE: Be prepared for corn/rice/split peas to scatter all over the floor.  Ignore it. Play with the kids, they can help clean up later…working that pincer grasp to pick up grains of corn from the floor 😉   Or not… Either way, enjoy the play/learning/growth experience with your kids and don’t worry about the mess. Brooming up corn into a dustpan is another fantastic occupation for kids. 🙂

    If keeping the spill factor to a minimum is a must, try using a tablecloth under the sensory bin. Or, take the sensory bin outdoors if you like.

    Thanksgiving sensory play ideas for kids include making a sensory bin with turkeys, wheat stalks, gourds, and more.

    Add Thanksgiving Items

    Next, add materials to manipulate, find, hide, scoop, and pour.

    Make the Thanksgiving sensory play meaningful by adding items that foster gratitude and thankfulness. One sensory bin item can include gratitude leaves like we made for our Thanksgiving tree. Cut paper leaves and each family member can write what they are thankful for. Scatter the leaves in the sensory bin. Best of all, you can reuse those gratitude leaves after the sensory play is done. Make a Thanksgiving tree like we did, or hang them on a Thanksgiving garland.

    Other Thanksgiving Sensory Bin materials include:

    • Fabric scraps
    • Gratitude leaves
    • Fake leaves
    • Real leaves
    • Paper leaves
    • Fall décor
    • Feathers
    • Acorns
    • Scraps of paper
    • Gourds
    • Decorations
    • Turkey figures
    • Wheat sprigs
    • Pine cones
    • Acorns
    This Thanksgiving sensory bin offers opportunities for fine motor skills.

    ADD Sensory Bin Scoops

    One final piece to a sensory bin are tools to scoop, pour, and sort. These items help to develop areas like fine motor skills, dexterity, eye-hand coordination, and bilateral coordination.

    Pouring and scooping are an oppourtunity to work on refined motor skills as kids pour the materails without spilling. They can explore how much to tilt the container or how much precision is needed to scoop the materials they want to manipulate.

    Some manipulating items to consider for a Thanksgiving sensory bin include:

    • Cups
    • Tongs
    • Tweezers
    • Baskets
    • Small cups
    • Spoons
    • Small bowls

      And baskets for sorting!  

    Use baskets, cups, and scoops to help kids build fine motor skills in a Thanksgiving sensory bin.

      Baby Girl thought it would be more fun to climb INTO the corn bin!  

    Sensory bin ideas for toddlers

      It feels great on the toes!    (Yes, I stuck my toes in the corn with the kiddos… NO, I will not harm your eyes with THAT picture!)  

        Cute baby toes, YES, we need more pictures of those!   

    Thanksgiving sensory bin for toddlers using materials to explore sensory.

        Big Sister started the sorting game.  She collected all of the flowers into this pot.  

    Thanksgiving Sensory Bin for Learning

    Work on specific concepts with your sensory bin, including:

    • Sorting by colors
    • Adding or subtracting
    • Sorting by patterns or textures
    • Sort by type of object
    • Spatial awareness
    • Size awareness
    • Sort by texture
    • Shapes

    Use a sensory bin to help kids learn to sort by color.

    Sorting by Color…

    Sorting by Object…

    Little Guy thought we needed to sort the socks… 🙂

    Sensory bin ideas for Thanksgiving include sorting items by texture, shape, and color.
    Thanksgiving sensory ideas include this sensory bin with items to scoop and manipulate.

      Everyone enjoyed talking about and feeling the objects… Scratchy wheat stalks:  

        Soft feathers (these were cut from scraps of fabric I had around the house):  

    A toddler sensory bin can include different materials and items to explore.

     Little Guy thought it would be pretty fun to lay IN the cool corn to see how that felt: “It’s pretty comfy, Mom”!  

          How many kids can you fit into a bin? It looks like the answer is three. 🙂  

    Sensory bin materials include dry corn, fabric swatches, feathers.

          There were lots of colors and textures to explore in this sensory bin!    

    Thanksgiving theme sensory bin for exploring colors and textures.
    Thanksgiving sensory bin to manipulate and build fine motor skills.


     Scooping, sorting, exploring the senses, fostering creativity, building language skills, working on fine motor skills…We did so much more than just playing with this fun Thanksgiving Sensory Bin! I am Thankful for Today!    

    Have you made a fall themed sensory bin? 

    More Thanksgiving activities

    Turkey crafts
    Turkey Crafts
    Thanksgiving mindfulness activity with deep breathing exercise to use as a coping strategy with kids.
    Thanksgiving Mindfulness Activity
    Thanksgiving suncatcher craft
    Thanksgiving Suncatcher Craft

    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.

    Turkey Napkin Rings

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    Turkey napkin ring craft

    Another Turkey craft happened in our house!  This time we made a Turkey Napkin Ring.  And just in time for your Thanksgiving dinner place settings 🙂  This is another cardboard turkey craft that uses a recycled paper roll…much like this toilet paper roll turkey post that we updated recently. Today’s cardboard tube turned into a turkey napkin ring that would look amazing at the family Thanksgiving table.

    Turkey napkin ring that kids can make! This Thanksgiving table craft is so much fun for the kids table!
    Thanksgiving Turkey Silverware Napkin Rings

    Turkey Napkin Rings

    We started with a paper roll and a hole punch.  The holes were easy to punch toward the ends of the roll. To reach the center, you will have to bend the roll a bit and double up the cardboard while punching the holes.  That was pretty tough to do, but not impossible. 

    I think next time we make these, I would cut the paper tube to maybe 3 to 4 inches long.  Then, it would be easy to punch holes along the length of the tube.  

    This turkey napkin ring craft is a great way for kids to develop fine motor skills.

    Big Sister took care of pushing the feathers into the holes.  We used fall colored pipe cleaners to give the turkey a fall festive look.  We cut the pipe cleaners in half first.

    Cutting pipe cleaners is a great hand strengthening activity for kids working on hand strength and scissor skills.  They need to squeeze the scissors with a gross grasp and really encourage strengthening of the arches of the hand. 

    Kids can make this turkey napkin ring craft with a cardboard tube and pipe cleaners.

     

    After our pipe cleaners were cut in half, Big Sister folded the pipe cleaner in half (without creasing the fold) and pushed both ends of into the holes.  Another great fine motor activity! 

    She was able to use a tripod grasp to push the pipe cleaner into the holes…and had a lot of fun!  We doubled up a few of the holes for extra feathers (and a little more restiveness when she pushed the pipe cleaners into the holes…extra fine motor work!)  

    Use cardboard rolls for crafts like this turkey napkin ring that kids can make for Thanksgiving dinner.

     

    The turkey is looking pretty good!  Glue a couple of googly eyes and a beak.  We used a scrap of foam sheet cut into a little triangle.   

    Turkey craft for kids turns into a turkey napkin ring for the dinner table.

      Big Sister added the wattle to the turkey with a marker…and added a little red dot to the beak.  “That is his nostril, Mom.”  

    How cute is this toilet paper roll craft that turns into a paper roll napkin ring.

      Pretty cute!  

    Use this turkey napkin ring craft as the Thanksgiving kids table decorations!
    Kids

    Wrap a set of silverware in a paper towel (or fabric) and the turkey is ready to join the table settings!

    Use the turkey napkin ring craft as a Thanksgiving kids table craft.

    This would make a great Thanksgiving kids table craft for kids to make and build right at the kids table!    

    It’s also a great fine motor activity for kids using a toilet paper roll!

    Wouldn’t this look completely cute along with the Turkey Juice Box covers from yesterday’s post??  

    For more Thanksgiving activities for kids, try this Thanksgiving Fine Motor Kit. It’s on sale now and covers handwriting, pencil control, coloring, scissor skills, bilateral coordination, eye-hand coordination, and more:

    Thanksgiving Fine Motor Kit
    Thanksgiving Fine Motor Kit…on sale now!

    Thanksgiving Fine Motor Kit…on sale now!

    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.

    Fine Motor turkey

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    This Fine Motor Turkey works all the small motor skills of the hands!

    Before the kiddos do this project, start out by using a pen to poke holes along the top of a thick paper plate.  Pushing the feathers into the plate’s holes will work their Tripod Grasp.  Use feathers, pipe cleaners, felt feathers to explore different textures, work the patterns, or just pop them in any old order.
    Big Sister helped me make this turkey as an example for a playgroup craft.  She counted out the googly eyes (picking them up with a Pincer Grasp) by twos.
    Basic math skills and figuring out that 8 sets of 2’s are 16.
    Cutting triangle beaks and folding them to isolate the index finger (Important in separating the two sides of the hand)…
    Little squares of tissue paper…
    Crumbling little bits of paper strengthens the intrinsic muscles of the hands.  
    The Finished product!
    I love that she used two different sized eyes. And pulled the feet off. “I like it better without feet, Mom”.  Her turkey has a lot of character!  Just like my little Big Sister!
    ~Colleen
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