By now, I’m sure you have heard of the kid-friendly series called How To Catch A… These books are so fun and the kids love the different shenanigans that can happen throughout each of the individual books. How to Catch a Turkey is one of my absolute favorite books to use during Thanksgiving time. I love how the book encourages students to really think this is related to them. It’s a hystical book and the kids giggle throughout the entire book!
STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) activities are a great way to get kids engaged in hands-on learning. Around Thanksgiving, designing a turkey-themed STEM project is perfect for incorporating science and engineering skills in a fun, seasonal way. In this article, we’ll explore ideas for Turkey STEM activities that will get your students excited about building, designing, and problem-solving.
Overview of Turkey STEM Activities
The basic framework of a Turkey STEM activity is giving students a challenge to design and build a device to catch or contain a turkey. This ties into classic children’s books like “How to Catch a Turkey” where kids have to creatively trap a runaway bird.
There are a few key elements that make up a good Turkey STEM lesson:
-
Presenting a Real-World Scenario Set the stage by describing a real-world situation like needing to catch a turkey that escaped before Thanksgiving dinner This gives context and meaning to their engineering challenge
-
Design Parameters Give students specific design requirements and materials to work within such as building a turkey cage out of Popsicle sticks in 30 minutes. Constraints drive creativity!
-
Hands-on Building: Allow plenty of time for students to design, test, and improve their turkey traps or cages. This is where the learning happens!
-
Reflection: Have students share their designs and evaluate what worked well and what could be improved. Reflection is key to solidifying the learning process.
The open-ended nature of these types of STEM activities means students can exercise their creativity and problem-solving skills. Next, we’ll look at some specific examples of how to conduct a Turkey STEM project.
Detailed Turkey STEM Activity Ideas
Here are two popular approaches to structuring a turkey-themed STEM lesson for elementary students: building a turkey trap or designing a turkey cage.
Turkey Trap STEM Challenge
If you want to follow the plot of “How to Catch a Turkey” closely, have students build turkey traps. The goal is to catch an escaped bird before Thanksgiving dinner.
Materials Needed:
-
Craft supplies like Popsicle sticks, pipe cleaners, tissue boxes, straws, etc.
-
Turkey templates printed out on cardstock
-
Tape, scissors, glue
Instructions:
-
Read “How to Catch a Turkey” to set up the story framework.
-
Explain the design challenge: build a working trap to catch a turkey using the craft materials provided. Show them the turkey template they must contain.
-
As a class, brainstorm example trap designs. Emphasize key principles like stability and effectiveness.
-
Break into small groups and give them 30 minutes to build. Monitor and provide guidance as needed.
-
Have each group present their trap and test it with the paper turkey. See if they successfully catch it!
-
Reflect on what trap designs worked well. Discuss improvements students would make.
Through this challenge, students learn about engineering design while building STEM skills.
Turkey Cage STEM Challenge
If you want a simplified version, have students build a sturdy turkey cage instead of a trap.
Materials Needed:
-
Mini marshmallows, toothpicks, popsicle sticks and pipe cleaners work well
-
Turkey templates printed out
-
Wax paper for building on
Instructions:
-
Present the scenario: you need to build a cage to keep turkeys secured before Thanksgiving.
-
Explain requirements: build a freestanding cage that will hold 3 turkey templates.
-
Brainstorm cage ideas as a class focusing on stability and containment.
-
Give student pairs materials and 30 minutes to build their turkey cage.
-
Have students test cages by placing 3 turkey templates inside. Did they hold?
-
Discuss what cage designs worked well and what could improve them.
The simplicity of this project makes it perfect for younger elementary students or classrooms with limited time. The key is facilitating the design process and reflection time to enrich learning.
Enhancing Learning with Turkey STEM
Beyond the hands-on fun, incorporating thoughtful discussions and worksheets can help students get even more out of a Turkey STEM activity:
-
Planning sheets: Have students draw their design and explain their plan before building. This teaches thoughtful preparation.
-
Reflection sheets: Use worksheets with sentence frames to guide students in evaluating their designs. This solidifies the engineering process.
-
STEM journals: Have students document their designs through detailed drawings and observations in a science notebook. This develops documentation skills.
-
Literacy integration: Tie in fiction books like “How to Catch a Turkey” or nonfiction texts about turkeys to integrate language arts.
-
Peer discussions: Have students share their designs in small groups and give feedback. This boosts communication and collaboration.
With some creativity, you can develop a really thoughtful Turkey STEM project that develops critical thinking, problem-solving, teamwork, and engineering skills in an engaging way.
Tips for Successful Turkey STEM Activities
Here are some key tips to help your Turkey STEM project run smoothly:
-
Give clear expectations and design constraints so students have direction.
-
Involve students in brainstorming design ideas before building.
-
Have students work collaboratively in small groups to encourage teamwork.
-
Allow enough time for designing, testing, and modifying designs through an iterative process.
-
Provide sufficient materials for prototyping multiple ideas.
-
Take lots of photos of student projects to document and display their designs.
-
Facilitate active reflection time for students to evaluate their solutions.
-
Integrate math, science, and literacy connections where possible for cross-curricular learning.
Adapting Turkey STEM for High School
While turkey-themed STEM is commonly aimed at elementary grades, high school students can also benefit from these activities with some adaptations:
-
Make the design challenge more complex by adding more constraints and requirements.
-
Provide fewer directions and let student teams plan their own testing procedures.
-
Encourage sophisticated documentation of designs through lab reports or presentations.
-
Focus more on precise calculations, measurements, and modeling.
-
Emphasize marketable skills like collaboration, critical thinking and communication.
-
Allow student teams to self-direct their designs with minimal guidance.
The open-ended nature of a Turkey STEM activity allows for differentiation to various grade levels for increased engagement and learning.
Turkey STEM Projects Teach Valuable Skills
Well-designed turkey STEM activities introduce kids to real-life engineering challenges while building critical thinking and innovation skills. Students have fun designing creative solutions within the given constraints while collaborating with peers. Turkey STEM projects provide the perfect gateway into problem-based learning using this fun, seasonal theme.
So put those leftover Thanksgiving craft supplies to use! With some thoughtful planning and facilitation, you can develop an engaging Turkey STEM project to let your students’ creativity and STEM skills soar. What unique turkey trap or cage designs will your budding engineers invent? The only limit is their innovation and your collection of craft materials!
questions you’ll probably be asked
- How much time do they have? I give my students about 2 hours broken up over 2 days to complete.
- How big is the turkey? I print out the mini-turkey and it’s about 3 inches tall by 2 inches wide.
- What do you do with the traps afterwards? SEND THEM HOME!
Start with How to Catch a Turkey
For this ELAmentary STEM project, start off by reading the book, How to Catch a Turkey. Encourage the students to recognize what the problem is from the book. I love to really emphasize that this is such a chaotic book.
I will often say OH NO! Don’t do that… or LOOK WHAT THEY ARE DOING!
Once you have finished the book, the kids will be excited and giddy. Now you can give them the letter. The letter is from Max and he is going to challenge you to build a trap for your turkey.
When I first started this project with my students, we only had 2-3 supplies for this build. I give them popsicle sticks, pipe cleaners, and glue. I have noticed that students that build the plan first can use these items and nothing else.
However, there are some that can’t understand How to Catch a Turkey with just those 3 supplies. If I notice that some students are struggling with the task at hand, I will provide them with more supplies. I will also provide tape, construction paper, soda pop boxes, cans, markers or crayons. This allows the students to think outside the box with more supplies so they aren’t hindered by the lack of supplies.
Now that the students have their supplies, we can build! Right? Well…kinda. We need a plan and answer some questions. I have my students answer the following questions as part of their build. It helps get their ideas out of their head and onto the paper.
- What do you already know about catching things like turkeys?
- What will your trap look like? How will it be different from your classmates?
- Draw a quick sketch of your trap.
- Explain your design.
- What is one way that you could improve your trap?
- What went well?
How to Catch a Turkey STEM Activity
What is a turkey trap stem activity?
A turkey trap STEM activity presents students with the real-world scenario that they need to catch a turkey for Thanksgiving dinner. Their challenge is to design and build a working turkey trap using everyday materials like cardboard, tape string pipe cleaners etc.
How do you make a turkey trap for kids?
Here are some common turkey trap designs to spark kids’ creativity: Build a cage with an opening that lures the turkey inside. Once entered, the door shuts behind them. Engineer a pulley system to drop a net on the turkey. Students must figure out net size and rope setup. Simple trap where a stick props up a box.
How long does it take to build a turkey trap?
Give students approximately 30 minutes to build their turkey traps. Sit back and watch as students engage in real-world problem solving! At the end of the activity, be sure to have students describe and demonstrate how their trap works. This activity is always a huge hit with students during the Thanksgiving season!
How do you capture a turkey & waterfowl?
Capture with net cannon, rocket nets, net gun, or drop-net – This technique is widely used for turkey and waterfowl (Dill and Thornsberry 1950). It is required that personnel using any of these devices powered by black powder obtain training and be certified to use the equipment and handle explosives.
Can You Hold 3 turkeys in a cage?
If you decide to use marshmallows and toothpicks like us, here is a potential cage design for holding 3 turkeys. My kids first started building the cage by constructing a fence around the turkey. They realized that the fence was not very tall and that the turkeys could jump over it.
How do you get a Turkey out of a house?
Dig a hole and disguise it. Turkey falls in and walls are too high for them to escape. Make a loop that tightens on the turkey’s feet when entered. Position over food bait. If space permits, set up distinct stations for planning, designing, building, and testing. This allows multiple groups to work at once.